/YIIIZ 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

POET,   DRAMATIST,   AND   MAN 


THE    KI.Y    HOUSE   PORTRAIT   OF   WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARK. 

The  original,  now  in  the  possession  of  the  Trustees  of  the  Birthplace  at  Stratford,  formerly 
belonged  to  the  Bishop  of  Ely.     It  is  inscribed  M  39  x  1603. 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

POET,  DRAMATIST,  AND  MAN 


BY 


HAMILTON    WRIGHT    MABIE 

AUTHOR   OF   "  MY    STUDY    FIRE,"    "  UNDER   THE   TREES   AND 
ELSEWHERE,"    "THE   LIFE  OF  THE   SPIRIT,"   ETC. 


WITH  ONE  HUNDRED  ILLUSTRATIONS 


THIRD  EDITION,  WITH   CORRECTIONS 


Nefo  gorfe 
THE    MACMILLAN    COMPANY 

LONDON:   MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LTD. 
IQ22 

All  rtsrhts  reserved 


PBINTED  IN  THB  UNITED  BTATB8  OF  AMERICA 


COPYRIGHT,  1900, 
BY  THE  OUTLOOK  CO. 

COPYRIGHT,  1900, 
BY  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped  October,  1900.     Reprinted  December, 
1900  : 


NortopoB 
i.  8.  Gushing  &>Co.  -  Berwick  «c  Smith 
Norwood  Mass.  U.S.A. 


To 
MY  MOTHER 

and 

To  the  Memory  of 
MY  FATHER 


572143 


ON  SHAKESPEARE 

What  needs  my  Shakespeare  for  his  honoured  bones 

The  labour  of  an  age  in  piled  stones  ? 

Or  that  his  hallowed  reliques  should  be  hid 

Under  a  star-ypointing  pyramid  ? 

Dear  son  of  memory,  great  heir  of  fame, 

What  need'st  thou  such  weak  witness  of  thy  name  ? 

Thou  in  our  wonder  and  astonishment 

Hast  built  thyself  a  livelong  monument. 

For  whilst,  to  the  shame  of  slow  endeavouring  art, 

Thy  easy  numbers  flow,  and  that  each  heart 

Hath  from  the  leaves  of  thy  unvalued  book 

Those  Delphic  lines  with  deep  impression  took, 

Then  thou,  our  fancy  of  itself  bereaving, 

Dost  make  us  marble  with  too  much  conceiving, 

And  so  sepulchered,  in  such  pomp  dost  lie 

That  kings  for  such  a  tomb  would  wish  to  die. 

JOHN  MILTON.    1630. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  I 

PAGE 

THE  FORERUNNERS  OF  SHAKESPEARE I 

CHAPTER  II 
BIRTH  AND  BREEDING 29 

CHAPTER   III 
SHAKESPEARE'S  COUNTRY 52 

CHAPTER  IV 
MARRIAGE  AND  LONDON 76 

CHAPTER  V 
THE  LONDON  STAGE ,    101 

CHAPTER  VI 
APPRENTICESHIP .    125 

CHAPTER  VII 
THE  FIRST  FRUITS e  148 

CHAPTER   VIII 

THE  POETIC  PERIOD .    177 

vii 


vm  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER   IX 

PAGE 

THE  SONNETS 207 

CHAPTER  X 
THE  HISTORICAL  PLAYS 228 

CHAPTER  XI 
THE  COMEDIES  .        . 248 

CHAPTER  XII 
THE  APPROACH  OF  TRAGEDY 271 

CHAPTER  XIII 
THE  EARLIER  TRAGEDIES 290 

CHAPTER  XIV 
THE  LATER  TRAGEDIES     .        . 314 

CHAPTER    XV 
THE  ETHICAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  THE  TRAGEDIES  .    342 

CHAPTER  XVI 
THE  ROMANCES 360 

CHAPTER  XVII 
THE  LAST  YEARS  AT  STRATFORD 387 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

FULL-PAGE   PLATES,   ETC. 

THE  ELY  HOUSE  PORTRAIT  OF  WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE    Frontispiece 

MARY  ARDEN'S  COTTAGE facing  page   32 

GRAMMAR  SCHOOL,  STRATFORD  .     "         "46 

IN  THE  GARDEN  OF  ANNE  HATHAWAY'S  COTTAGE        .     "         "90 

The  figure  in  the  foreground  is  the  late  custodian,  Mrs.  Baker. 
SHAKESPEARE'S  LONDON    ....        between  pages  120,  121 

Double  page,  half-tone  map.    Stilliard's  map  of  the  city  in  the  reign 
of  Elizabeth. 

STRATFORD  FROM  THE  MEMORIAL  THEATRE      .         facing  page  172 

WARWICK  CASTLE «         "     256 

THE  MEMORIAL  THEATRE,  STRATFORD     ..."         "    316 

From  Clopton  Bridge. 

THE  HOUSE  ON  HENLEY  STREET,  STRATFORD.        .     "         "     348 
Commonly  known  as  the  Birthplace. 

THE  GARDEN  AT  NEW  PLACE,  STRATFORD  "         "     286 

ILLUSTRATIONS   IN   THE   TEXT 

PAGE 

A  Mystery  Play  in  York  Cathedral 8 

Pageants  on  which  were  given  Miracle  Plays        .         .         .         .12 

Four  Morality  Players  :  Contemplation  —  Perseverance  —  Imagi- 
nation, and  Free  Will      ...         .         .         .         .         .16 

From  a  black-letter  copy  of  the  Morality  "  Hycke-Scorner." 
The  Talbot  Inn  — Chaucer's  "Tabard"       ....  20 

Where  the  early  players  often  raised  their  rude  stage. 


X  LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

The  Globe  Theatre,  Southwark 25 

An  Early  Drawing  of  Shakespeare's  Birthplace    .         .        .        -31 

Shakespeare's  Birth  Record         .        .        .        .        .        .        ,34 

The  three  crosses  mark  the  line. 

Font  in  Trinity  Church,  where  Shakespeare  was  baptized     .         .  35 

The  Room  in  which  Shakespeare  was  born 37 

A  Bit  of  the  Wall  of  the  Room  in  which  Shakespeare  was  born  .  38 

Latin  Room,  Grammar  School,  Stratford 43 

The  Approach  to  Holy  Trinity  Church         .         .        .        .  45 

The  Guild  Chamber  in  the  Grammar  School        ....  48 

Guy's  Cliff  and  the  Avon 50 

From  an  old  print. 

Queen  Elizabeth 54 

Kenilworth  Castle 57 

From  an  old  print,  showing  the  castle  as  it  appeared  in  1620.  The 
castle  was  destroyed  during  and  after  the  Civil  War. 

Mervyn's  Tower .58 

In  which  Amy  Robsart  was  imprisoned. 

The  Earl  of  Leicester,  1588          . 60 

The  Path  from  the  Forest  of  Arden  to  Stratford  ....      63 

A  typical  English  footpath  through  the  meadows,  with  hedges  of  haw- 
thorn on  either  side.  These  paths  are  sometimes  reached  by  a  stile, 
as  in  this  case,  and  sometimes  by  a  kissing-gate. 

The  Forest  of  Arden 65 

The  remains  of  a  large  tract  of  forest  which  formerly  stretched  away 
from  Stratford  on  the  west  and  north. 

Charlecote  House  from  the  Avon 67 

The  Road  to  Hampton  Lucy 70 

The  "  Bank  where  the  Wild  Thyme  blows  "          ....       73 

This  bank  is  not  far  from  Shottery,  and  is  the  only  place  near  Strat- 
ford where  the  wild  thyme  is  found. 

The  Path  to  Shottery 79 

Kissing-gate  in  foreground. 

The  Boar  at  Charlecote  Gate  .  81 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS  xi 

PAGE 

Charlecote 83 

As  it  appeared  in  the  year  1722. 

Sir  T.  Lucy 84 

Monument  in  Charlecote  Church. 

Anne  Hathaway's  Cottage    .        . 86 

The  living-room :  Mrs.  Baker,  the  custodian,  who  died  in  1899,  a 
member  of  the  Hathaway  family,  by  the  fireplace. 

A  View  of  Warwick  in  Shakespeare's  Time          ...  89 

From  an  old  print:  S.  John's  — S.  Nicolas'  Church  — The  Castle  — 
S.  Maria's  Church  — The  Priorye  and  Grove  —  "  The  prospect  of  War- 
wick from  Coventre  roade  on  the  Northeast  part  of  the  Towne." 

The  Crown  Inn,  Oxford        ........      92 

From  an  old  print.  Where,  according  to  tradition,  Shakespeare 
lodged  on  his  way  to  London.  This  inn  has  entirely  disappeared. 

The  Zoust  Portrait  of  William  Shakespeare          ....       94 
Now  in  the  possession  of  Sir  John  Lister-Kaye,  the  Grange,  Wakefield. 

Old  London  Bridge 99 

From  an  old  print. 

Robert  Dudley,  Earl  of  Leicester 107 

From  a  contemporary  crayon  sketch. 

The  Bankside,  Southwark,  showing  the  Globe  Theatre          .         .     109 
From  Visscher's  "  View  of  London,"  drawn  in  1616. 

The  Globe  Theatre,  Southwark 115 

From  a  drawing  in  the  illustrated  edition  of  Pennant's  "  London,"  in 
the  British  Museum. 

The  Bear-baiting  Garden .        .117 

This  stood  near  the  Globe  Theatre,  Bankside. 

The  Bankside,  Southwark,  showing  the  Swan  Theatre          .         .127 
From  Visscher's  "  View  of  London,"  drawn  in  1616. 

The  "  Black  Bust "  of  Shakespeare 123 

From  a  plaster  cast  of  the  original  terra-cotta  bust  owned  by  the 
Garrick  Club,  L. 

Queen  Elizabeth  enthroned 129 

From  a  rare  old  print. 

William  Shakespeare 135 

The  J.  Q.  A.  Ward  statue,  which  stands  at  the  entrance  to  the  Mall, 
Central  Park,  New  York. 


xii  LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 


Sir  Philip  Sidney          .         .         .        .        .        .        .         .        .     139 

Engraving  from  the  original  of  Sir  Anthony  More. 

The  Droeshout  Portrait  of  William  Shakespeare  .         .         .        .150 
At  present  in  the  Memorial  Picture  Gallery  at  Stratford. 

The   Tower  of   London,   about   the   Middle   of   the    Sixteenth 

Century 153 

From  an  old  print. 
Sir  Francis  Drake         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .        .158 

From  the  picture  belonging  to  J.  A.  Hope,  Esq. 
Sir  Walter  Raleigh 162 

Engraving  from  the  original  by  Zucchero. 
Thomas  Nashe    ..........     169 

From  an  early  pen  drawing. 

William  Shakespeare 171 

The  statue  on  the  Gower  Memorial,  Stratford. 

Michael  Draytoji .         .         .         .  .         .        .        .         .     179 

From  an  old  and  rare  pen  drawing. 

Edmund  Spenser 182 

William  Cecil,  Lord  Burleigh.  Prime  Minister  of  Queen  Elizabeth  .     185 
From  the  original  painting  at  Hatfield  House. 

Old  Palace,  Whitehall .         .         .         .         .         .        .         .         .     191 

From  a  print  engraved  for  Lambert's  "  History  of  London." 

London  in  1543 198,  199 

From  Westminster  to  Bishopsgate  and  Leadenhall. 

London  in  1 543   . 200 

From  the  Tower  to  Greenwich  Palace.    This  and  the  preceding  illus- 
trations are  after  an  old  print  in  the  Bodleian  Library. 

William  Herbert,  Earl  of  Pembroke,  Shakespeare's  Friend  and 

Patron         ....      ,,». 213 

From  an  engraving  by  T.  Jenkins,  after  the  original  of  Van  Dyke,  in 
the  collection  of  the  Earl  of  Pembroke. 

Henry  Wriothesley,  Earl  of  Southampton 223 

From  an  engraving  by  R.  Cooper,  after  the  original  of  Mirevelt,  in  the 
collection  of  the  Duke  of  Bedford. 

George  Chapman  #  .        .     226 

From  an  old  print. 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS  xiii 

PAGE 

John  Fletcher 231 

From  a  picture  in  the  possession  of  the  Earl  of  Clarendon. 

Warwick  from  the  London  Road 236 

S.  Peter's  Chapel  — The  Castle  Garden  — The   Mount— S.  Marie's 
Church  — The  Castle  — The  Priorye  — S.  Nicholas*  Church. 

Francis  Beaumont 240 

From  a  picture  in  the  possession  of  Colonel  Harcourt. 

Seal  of  the  Royal  Dramatic  College 244 

Garden  of  Dr.  John  Hall's  House 249 

Greenwich  Palace 261 

The  Hall  of  the  Middle  Temple  .  269 

Where  "  Twelfth  Night  "  was  played. 

The  Shakespeare  Monument  in  Holy  Trinity  Church,  Stratford    .     272 

Ben  Jonson 278 

From  a  picture  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Knight. 

Robert  Devereaux,  Earl  of  Essex 285 

After  the  original  of  Walker  in  the  collection  of  the  Marquis  of  Stafford. 

The  American  Fountain  and  Clock-tower,  Stratford      .         .         .  291 

Middle  Temple  Lane   ..........  294 

Queen  Elizabeth 300 

From  an  old  print. 

Kenilworth  Castle 305 

From  an  old  print,  "  From  the  old  parke  on  the  South  side  thereof." 

Francis  Bacon,  Lord  Verulam 312 

From  a  print  by  I.  Houbraken,  1738. 

Wilton  House      ..........  320 

Old  Clopton  Bridge 324 

The  Hall  at  Clopton 330 

James  I.  on  Horseback 337 

From  an  old  print. 

Henry,  Prince  of  Wales,  Son  of  James  1 343 

Kenilworth  Castle 353 

From  an  old  print,  "The  frospect  thereof  upon    the    road    from 
vCoventre  to  Warwick." 


xiv  LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

PACK 

Kenilworth  Castle 357 

From  an  old  print,  "  The  Prospect  thereof  upon  Bull-hill  neere  the 
road  from  Colehill  towards  Warwick." 

Holy  Trinity  Church  from  the  Avon 362 

From  a  photograph. 

The  Guild  Chapel  Porch 371 

Facsimile  of  the  Title-page  of  the  First  Folio  Edition  of  Shake- 
speare's "  The  Tempest " 381 

The  Signature  of  William  Shakespeare        .....  390 

The  Dining-Hall  at  Clopton 393 

The  Inscription  over  the  Grave  of  William  Shakespeare       .      396,  397 

Inscription  over  the  Grave  of  Shakespeare's  Wife        .         .         .  399 

Poets'  Corner,  Westminster          .......  403 

Shakespeare's  Death  Record 406 

Tailpiece 408 

From  carving  on  the  stalls  of  Holy  Trinity  Church. 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

POET,  DRAMATIST,  AND  MAN 


William   Shakespeare : 

POET,    DRAMATIST,    AND    MAN 
CHAPTER    I 

THE   FORERUNNERS    OF    SHAKESPEARE 

THE  history  of  the  growth  of  the  drama  is  one 
of  the  most  fascinating  chapters  in  the  record  of 
the  spiritual  life  of  the  race.  So  closely  is  it  bound 
up  with  that  life  that  the  unfolding  of  this  art 
appears,  wherever  one  looks  deeply  into  it,  as  a 
vital  rather  than  a  purely  artistic  process.  That 
art  has  ever  been  conceived  as  the  product  of  any- 
thing less  rich  and  deep  than  an  unfolding  of  life 
shows  how  far  we  have  been  separated  by  historic 
conditions  from  any  first-hand  contact  with  it,  any 
deep-going  and  adequate  conception  of  what  it  is, 
and  what  it  means  in  the  life  of  the  race.  It  re- 
quires a  great  effort  of  the  imagination  to  put  our- 
selves into  the  attitude  of  those  early  men  who  had 
the  passions  and  were  doing  the  work  of  men,  but 
who  had  the  fresh  and  responsive  imagination  of 
childhood;  who  were  so  closely  in  touch  with 


WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE 

nature  that  the 'whole  world  was  alive  to  them  in 
every  sight  and  sound.  Personification  was  not 
only  natural  but  inevitable  to  a  race  whose  imagina- 
tion was  far  in  advance  of  its  knowledge.  Such  a 
race  would  first  create  and  then  devoutly  believe 
the  story  of  Dionysus :  the  wandering  god,  master 
of  all  the  resources  of  vitality;  buoyant,  enthrall- 
ing, mysterious,  intoxicating;  in  whom  the  rising 
passion,  the  deep  instinct  for  freedom,  which  the 
spring  let  loose  in  every  imagination,  found  visible 
embodiment;  the  personification  of  the  ebbing  and 
rising  tide  of  life  in  Nature,  and,  therefore,  the 
symbol  of  the  spontaneous  and  inspirational  ele- 
ment in  life ;  the  personification  of  the  mysterious 
force  of  reproduction,  and  therefore  the  symbol  of 
passion  and  license. 

The  god  was  entirely  real ;  everybody  knew  that 
a  group  of  Tyrrhenian  sailors  had  seized  him  as 
he  sat  on  a  rock  on  the  seashore,  bound  him  with 
withes,  and  carried  him  to  the  deck  of  their  tiny 
piratical  craft ;  and  everybody  knew  also  that  the 
withes  had  fallen  from  him,  that  streams  of  wine 
ran  over  the  ship,  vines  climbed  the  mast  and  hung 
from  the  yards,  garlands  were  twined  about  the 
oars,  and  a  fragrance  as  of  vineyards  was  breathed 
over  the  sea.  Then  suddenly  a  lion  stood  among 
the  sailors,  who  sprang  overboard  and  were  changed 
into  dolphins ;  while  the  god,  taking  on  his  natural 
form,  ran  the  ship  into  port.  Such  a  being,  appeal- 
ing alike  to  the  imagination  and  the  passions,  per- 


THE    FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE  3 

sonifying  the  most  beautiful  mysteries  and  giving 
form  to  the  wildest  longings  of  the  body  and  the 
mind,  could  not  be  worshipped  save  by  rites  and 
ceremonies  which  were  essentially  dramatic. 

The  seed-time  and  harvest  festivals  furnished 
natural  occasions  for  such  a  worship ;  the  wor- 
shippers often  wore  goatskins  to  counterfeit  the 
Satyrs,  and  so  gave  tragedy  its  name.  Grouped 
about  rude  altars,  in  a  rude  chorus,  they  told  the 
story  of  the  god's  wanderings  and  adventures,  not 
with  words  only,  but  with  gesture,  dance,  and 
music.  The  expression  of  thought  and  feeling  was 
free  from  self-consciousness,  and  was  like  a  mirror 
of  the  emotions  of  the  worshipper.  This  ballad- 
dance,  which  Mr.  Moulton  describes  as  a  kind  of 
literary  protoplasm  because  several  literary  forms 
were  implicit  in  it  and  were  later  developed  out  of 
it,  was  a  free,  spontaneous,  natural  act  of  worship ; 
it  was  also  a  genuine  drama,  which  unfolded  by 
easy  gradations  into  a  noble  literary  form.  The 
frequent  repetition  of  the  story  threw  its  dramatic 
element  into  more  striking  relief:  the  narrative 
gradually  detached  itself  from  the  choral  parts  and 
fell  to  individual  singers ;  these  singers  separated 
themselves  from  the  chorus  and  gave  their  parts 
increasing  dramatic  quality  and  distinctness ;  until, 
by  a  process  of  rude  and  almost  unconscious  evolu- 
tion, the  story  was  acted  instead  of  narrated,  and 
the  dramatic  poet,  when  he  arrived,  found  all  the 
materials  for  a  complete  drama  ready  to  his  hand.  It 


4  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

is  sober  history,  therefore,  and  not  figurative  speech^ 
that  the  drama  was  born  at  the  foot  of  the  altar. 

And  more  than  eighteen  hundred  years  later  the 
drama  was  born  again  at  the  foot  of  the  altar. 
Whatever  invisible  streams  of  tradition  may  have 
flowed  from  the  days  of  a  declining  theatre  at 
Rome  through  the  confused  and  largely  recordless 
life  of  the  early  Middle  Ages,  it  may  safely  be 
assumed  that  the  modern  drama  began,  as  the 
ancient  drama  had  begun,  in  the  development  of 
worship  along  dramatic  lines.  In  the  history  of 
fairy  tales  and  folk-lore,  the  explanation  of  striking 
similarities  between  the  old  and  the  new  is  to  be 
sought,  probably,  in  the  laws  of  the  mind  rather 
than  in  the  direct  transmission  of  forms  or  mate- 
rials. When  spiritual  and  intellectual  conditions 
are  repeated,  the  action  or  expression  of  the  mind 
affected  by  them  is  likely  to  be  repeated.  In 
every  age  men  of  a  certain  temperament  drama- 
tize their  own  experience  whenever  they  essay  to 
describe  it,  and  dramatize  whatever  material  comes 
to  their  hand  for  the  purpose  of  entertaining 
others.  The  instinct  which  prompts  men  of  this 
temper  to  make  a  story  of  every  happening  by 
selecting  the  most  striking  incidents,  rearranging 
them,  and  heightening  the  effect  by  skilful  group- 
ing, has  made  some  kind  of  drama  inevitable  in 
every  age.  When  the  influence  of  Menander, 
modified  and  adapted  to  Roman  taste  by  Terence, 
Plautus,  and  their  successors,  was  exhausted,  farces, 


THE  FORERUNNERS   OF  SHAKESPEARE  5 

with  music,  pantomime,  and  humorous  dialogue, 
largely  improvised,  met  the  general  need  with  the 
coarse  fun  which  suited  a  time  of  declining  taste 
and  decaying  culture.  The  indecency  and  vulgar- 
ity of  these  purely  popular  shows  became  more 
pronounced  as  the  Roman  populace  sank  in  intelli- 
gence and  virtue ;  the  vigour  which  redeemed  in 
part  their  early  license  gave  place  to  the  grossest 
personalities  and  the  cheapest  tricks  and  feats  of 
skill. 

The  mimes,  or  players,  carried  this  degenerate 
drama  into  the  provinces,  where  taste  was  even  less 
exacting  than  in  Rome,  and  the  half-heathen  world 
was  entertained  by  cheap  imitations  of  the  worst 
amusements  of  the  Capital.  At  a  still  later  date, 
in  market-places,  on  village  greens,  in  castle  yards, 
and  even  at  Courts,  strolling  players  recited,  pos- 
tured, sang,  danced,  played  musical  instruments, 
and  broke  up  the  monotony  of  life  at  a  time  when 
means  of  communication  were  few,  slow,  and  expen- 
sive. It  is  difficult  for  modern  men  to  realize  in 
imagination  the  isolation  of  small  communities  and 
of  great  castles  in  the  Middle  Ages.  The  stroll- 
ing player  was  welcome,  not  only  because  he  was 
entertaining,  but  because  he  brought  the  air  of  the 
remote  world  with  him. 

The  vulgarity  and  indecency  of  shows  of  such  an 
origin,  everywhere  adapting  themselves  to  popular 
taste  at  a  time  when  popular  taste  was  coarse  to  the 
last  degree,  were  inevitable.  Then,  as  now,  society 


6  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

had  the  kind  of  entertainment  for  which  it  asked  ; 
then,  as  now,  the  players  were  bent  on  pleasing  the 
people.  The  Church,  having  other  ends  in  view, 
tried  to  purify  the  general  taste  by  purifying  the 
amusements  of  the  people,  and  in  the  fifth  century 
the  players  of  various  kinds  —  mimes,  histriones, 
joculatores — were  put  under  formal  ecclesiastical 
condemnation.  The  Church  not  only  condemned 
the  players ;  she  excluded  them  from  her  sacraments. 

The  players  continued  to  perform  in  the  face  of 
ecclesiastical  disapproval,  and  they  found  audiences ; 
for  the  dramatic  instinct  lies  deep  in  men,  and  the 
only  way  to  shut  out  vulgar  and  indecent  plays  is  to 
replace  them  by  plays  of  a  better  quality.  The  play 
persists,  and  cannot  be  successfully  banned.  This 
degenerate  practice  of  a  once  noble  art  came  into 
England  after  the  Norman  Conquest,  and  the  play- 
ers became,  not  only  the  entertainers  of  the  people, 
but  the  story-tellers  and  reporters  of  the  period. 
They  made  the  monotony  of  life  more  bearable. 

How  much  indirect  influence  this  humble  and 
turbid  stream  of  dramatic  activity  may  have  had  on 
the  development  of  the  English  drama  cannot  be 
determined;  the  chief  influence  in  the  making  of 
that  drama  came  from  the  Church.  The  Church 
condemned  the  manifestation  of  the  dramatic  in- 
stinct, but  it  did  not  fall  into  the  later  error  of  con- 
demning the  instinct  itself ;  on  the  contrary,  it  was 
quick  to  recognize  and  utilize  that  instinct.  It  had 
long  appealed  to  the  dramatic  instinct  in  its  wor- 


THE   FORERUNNERS  OF    SHAKESPEARE  7 

shippers ;  for  the  Mass  is  a  dramatization  of  certain 
fundamental  ideas  generally  held  throughout  Chris- 
tendom for  many  centuries.  From  the  sixth  century 
the  Mass  was  the  supreme  act  of  worship  through- 
out Western  Europe.  "  In  the  wide  dimensions 
which  in  course  of  time  the  Mass  assumed,"  says 
Hagenbach,  "  there  lies  a  grand,  we  are  almost 
inclined  to  say  an  artistic,  idea.  A  dramatic  pro- 
gression is  perceptible  in  all  the  symbolic  processes, 
from  the  appearance  of  the  celebrant  priest  at  the 
altar  and  the  confession  of  sins,  to  the  Kyrie  Elei- 
son,  and  from  this  to  the  grand  doxology,  after  which 
the  priest  turns  with  the  Dominus  vobiscum  to  the 
congregation,  calling  upon  it  to  pray.  Next,  we 
listen  to  the  reading  of  the  Epistle  and  the  Gospel. 
Between  the  two  actions  or  acts  intervenes  the 
Graduate  (a  chant),  during  which  the  deacon  as- 
cends the  lectorium.  With  the  Halleluia  con- 
cludes the  first  act ;  and  then  ensues  the  Mass  in  a 
more  special  sense,  which  begins  with  the  recitation 
of  the  Creed.  Then  again  a  Dominus  vobiscum 
and  a  prayer,  followed  by  the  offertory  and,  accom- 
panied by  the  further  ceremonies,  the  Consecration. 
The  change  of  substance  —  the  mystery  of  myste- 
ries —  takes  place  amid  the  adoration  of  the  congre- 
gation and  the  prayer  for  the  quick  and  the  dead ; 
then,  after  the  touching  chant  of  the  Agnus  Dei, 
ensues  the  Communion  itself,  which  is  succeeded 
by  prayer  and  thanksgiving,  the  salutation  of  peace, 
and  the  benediction." 


8 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


In  the  impressive  and  beautiful  liturgy  of  the 
Mass  the  dramatization  of  the  central  mystery  of 
the  Christian  faith  was  effected  by  action,  by  pan- 


A   MYSTERY   FLAY   IN   YORK   CATHEDRAL. 

tomime,  and  by  music.  There  was  no  purpose  to 
be  dramatic;  there  was  a  natural  evolution  of  the 
instinct  to  set  forth  a  truth  too  great  and  mysterious 
to  be  contained  in  words  by  symbols,  which  are  not 


THE   FORERUNNERS   OF    SHAKESPEARE  9 

only  more  inclusive  than  words  but  which  satisfy 
the  imagination,  and  by  action. 

The  Church  did  not  stop  with  a  dramatic  pres- 
entation of  the  sublimest  of  dramatic  episodes,  the 
vicarious  death  of  Christ ;  it  went  further  and  set 
forth  the  fact  and  the  truth  of  certain  striking  and 
significant  scenes  in  the  New  Testament.  As 
early  as  the  fifth  century  these  scenes  were  repro- 
duced in  the  churches  in  living  pictures,  with 
music.  In  this  manner  the  people  not  only  heard 
the  story  of  the  Adoration  of  the  Magi  and  of  the 
Marriage  of  Cana,  but  saw  the  story  in  tableaux. 
In  course  of  time  the  persons  in  these  tableaux 
spoke  and  moved,  and  then  it  was  but  a  logical  step 
to  the  representation  dramatically,  by  the  priests 
before  the  altar,  of  the  striking  or  significant  events 
in  the  life  of  Christ. 

Worshippers  were  approached  through  every 
avenue  of  expression :  the  churches  in  which  they 
sat  were  nobly  symbolical  in  structure ;  the  win- 
dows were  ablaze  with  Scriptural  story ;  altar-pieces, 
statues,  carvings,  and  pictures  continually  spoke  to 
them  in  a  language  of  searching  beauty.  In  some 
churches  the  priests  read  from  rolls  upon  which,  as 
they  were  unfolded  toward  the  congregation,  pic- 
ture after  picture  came  to  view.  Christmas,  Good 
Friday,  and  Easter  services  inevitably  took  on  dra- 
matic forms,  and  became  beautiful  in  their  reproduc- 
tion of  the  touching  and  tender  scenes  in  the  life  of 
Christ,  and  grewsome  in  their  literal  picturing  of 


10  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

his  sufferings  and  death.  The  dramatic  instinct 
had  been  long  at  work  in  the  development  of  wor- 
ship ;  a  play  on  the  Passion,  ascribed  to  Gregory  of 
Nazianzen,  dated  back  to  the  fourth  century.  This 
early  drama  was  a  succession  of  monologues,  but  it 
plainly  predicted  the  mystery  drama  of  the  twelfth 
and  thirteenth  centuries. 

There  was  nothing  forced  or  artificial  in  the 
growth  of  this  later  and  more  complete  drama;  a 
description  of  a  Durham  Good  Friday  service 
makes  us  see  the  easy  progression  toward  well- 
defined  drama :  "  Within  the  church  of  Durham, 
upon  Good  Friday,  there  was  a  marvellous  solemn 
service,  in  which  service  time,  after  the  Passion  was 
sung,  two  of  the  eldest  monks  took  a  goodly  large 
crucifix  all  of  gold,  of  the  semblance  of  our  Saviour 
Christ,  nailed  upon  the  Cross.  .  .  .  The  service 
being  ended,  the  said  two  monks  carried  the  Cross 
to  the  Sepulchre  with  great  reverence  (which  Sepul- 
chre was  set  up  that  morning  on  the  north  side  of 
the  choir,  nigh  unto  the  High  Altar,  before  the 
service  time),  and  then  did  lay  it  within  the  said 
Sepulchre  with  great  devotion." 

It  is  easy  to  follow  the  dramatic  development  of 
such  a  theme,  and  to  understand  how  beautiful  and 
impressive  worship  became  when  the  divine  tragedy 
was  not  only  sung  and  described,  but  acted  before 
the  high  altar  by  gorgeously  robed  priests.  Thus 
the  drama  was  born  a  second  time  at  the  foot  of  the 
altar. 


THE   FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE  II 

But  the  time  came  when  the  drama  parted  com- 
pany with  the  liturgy,  and,  as  in  its  development  in 
Greece,  took  on  a  life  of  its  own.  The  vernacular 
was  substituted  for  Latin ;  laymen  took  parts  of 
increasing  importance ;  the  place  of  representation 
was  changed  from  the  church  to  the  space  outside 
the  church  ;  the  liturgical  yielded  to  the  dramatic ; 
humour,  and  even  broad  farce,  were  introduced ; 
the  several  streams  of  dramatic  tradition  which  had 
come  down  from  an  earlier  time  were  merged  in 
the  fully  developed  Mystery  or  Miracle  play. 

The  trade  guilds  had  become  centres  of  organ- 
ized enterprise  in  the  towns,  and  the  presentation  of 
plays,  in  which  popular  religious  and  social  interest 
was  now  concentrated,  fell  into  their  hands.  Cities 
like  York,  Chester,  and  Coventry  fostered  the  grow- 
ing art  with  enthusiasm  and  generosity.  By  the 
beginning  of  the  fifteenth  century  the  presentation 
of  the  dramas  was  thoroughly  systematized.  In 
some  places  the  Mayor,  by  proclamation,  announced 
the  dates  of  presentation ;  in  other  places  special 
messengers  or  heralds  made  the  round  of  the  city 
and  gave  public  notice.  The  different  guilds 
undertook  the  presentation  of  different  acts  or 
scenes.  Two-story  wagons  took  the  place  of  the 
stage  in  front  of  the  church  or  in  the  square ;  on 
these  wagons,  or  pageants,  as  they  were  called,  the 
rude  dressing-rooms  were  on  the  lower  and  the 
stage  on  the  upper  story.  These  movable  theatres, 
starting  from  the  church,  passed  through  all  the 


12 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


principal  streets,  and,  at  important  points,  the  actors 
went  through  their  parts  in  the  presence  of  throngs 
of  eager  spectators  in  the  windows,  galleries,  door- 
ways, squares,  and  upon  temporary  scaffolds.  The 
plays  were  in  series  and  required  several  days  for 
presentation,  and  the  town  made  the  occasion  one 
of  general  and  hilarious  holiday. 


PAGEANTS   ON   WHICH   WERE   GIVEN    MIRACLE   PLAYS. 

On  the  pageants,  handsomely  decorated,  the 
spectators  saw  scenes  acted,  with  which  they  had 
been  made  familiar  by  every  kind  of  teaching.  The 
drama  in  the  Garden  of  Eden  was  presented  with 
uncompromising  realism,  Adam  and  Eve  appear- 
ing in  appropriate  attire ;  the  devil  played  a  great 
and  effective  part,  furnishing  endless  amusement 
by  his  buffoonery,  but  always  going  in  the  end  to 
his  own  place.  Pilate  and  Herod  divided  popular 
attention  by  their  semi-humorous  or  melodramatic 


THE   FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE  13 

roles,  and  Noah's  wife  afforded  an  opportunity  for 
the  play  of  monotonous  and  very  obvious  masculine 
wit  on  the  faults  and  frailty  of  woman.  The  con- 
struction of  these  semi-sacred  dramas,  dealing  with 
high  or  picturesque  events  and  incidents  in  Biblical 
story,  was  rude ;  the  mixture  of  the  sacred  and  the 
comic  so  complete  that  the  two  are  constantly 
merged;  the  frankness  of  speech  and  the  grossness 
almost  incredible  to  modern  taste.  It  would  be  a 
great  mistake,  however,  to  interpret  either  the  inter- 
mingling of  the  tragic  and  the  comic  or  the  gross- 
ness  of  speech  as  indicating  general  corruption ; 
they  indicate  an  undeveloped  rather  than  a  cor- 
rupt society.  The  English  people  were  morally 
sound,  but  they  were  coarse  in  habit  and  speech, 
after  the  manner  of  the  time.  There  was  as  much 
honest  and  sober  living  as  to-day;  the  grossness 
was  not  a  matter  of  character,  but  of  expression. 
Men  and  women  saw,  without  any  consciousness 
of  irreverence  or  incongruity,  the  figure  of  Deity 
enthroned  on  a  movable  stage,  with  Cherubim 
gathered  about  Him,  creating  the  world  with  the 
aid  of  images  of  birds  and  beasts,  with  branches 
plucked  from  trees,  and  with  lanterns  such  as  were 
carried  about  the  streets  at  night. 

Religion  was  not  a  department  or  partial  expres- 
sion of  life ;  it  was  inclusive  of  the  whole  range  of 
feeling  and  action.  It  embraced  humour  as  readily 
as  it  embraced  the  most  serious  conviction  and  the 
most  elevated  emotion.  It  was,  therefore,  entirely 


14  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

congruous  with  the  deepest  piety  of  the  time  that 
grotesque  figures,  monstrous  gargoyles,  broadly 
humorous  carvings  on  miserere  stalls,  should  be 
part  of  the  structure  of  those  vast  cathedrals 
which  are  the  most  sublime  expressions  in  art  of 
the  religious  life  of  the  race.  To  read  into  the 
grossness  and  indecency  of  expression  in  the 
fifteenth  century  the  moral  significance  which  such 
an  expression  would  have  in  the  nineteenth  century 
is  not  only  to  do  a  grave  injustice  to  many  genera- 
tions, but  to  betray  the  lack  of  a  sound  historic 
sense.  The  great  dramatists  who  followed  these 
early  unknown  playwrights  understood  that  the 
humorous  cannot  be  separated  from  the  tragic 
without  violating  the  facts  of  life ;  and  religion,  in 
its  later  expressions,  would  have  been  saved  from 
many  absurdities  and  much  destructive  narrowness 
if  the  men  who  spoke  for  it  had  not  so  strangely 
misunderstood  and  rejected  one  of  the  greatest 
qualities  of  the  human  spirit  —  that  quality  of 
humour  which,  above  all  others,  keeps  human 
nature  sane  and  sound. 

To  the  Mysteries  and  Miracle  plays  succeeded 
the  Moralities.  Whether  these  later  and  less 
dramatic  plays  were  developed  out  of  the  earlier 
dramatic  forms  is  uncertain ;  that  they  were  largely 
modelled  along  lines  already  well  defined  is  appar- 
ently well  established.  No  line  of  sharp  division 
as  regards  time,  theme,  or  manner  can  be  drawn 
between  the  two;  althotigh  certain  broad  differ- 


THE  FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE  15 

ences  are  evident  at  a  glance.  The  mediaeval  mind 
dealt  largely  with  types,  and  only  secondarily  with 
individuals ;  and  the  break  in  the  slow  and  uncon- 
scious progression  from  the  type  to  the  sharply 
defined  person,  which  registers  the  unfolding  not 
only  of  the  modern  mind  but  of  modern  art,  is  not 
inexplicable.  The  characters  in  the  Mysteries  and 
Miracle  plays  were  received  directly  or  indirectly 
from  Biblical  sources ;  in  the  Moralities  there  was, 
apparently,  an  attempt  to  create  new  figures.  These 
figures  were  more  abstract  and  far  less  human  than 
their  immediate  predecessors  in  the  pageants,  but 
they  may  have  had  the  value  of  a  halting  and 
uncertain  attempt  to  create  instead  of  reproduce. 
The  first  result  was,  apparently,  a  retrogression 
from  the  dramatic  idea:  the  earlier  plays  had 
shown  some  skill  in  the  development  of  charac- 
ter; in  the  Moralities  the  stage  was  surrendered 
to  the  personifications  of  abstract  virtues.  In  place 
of  a  very  real  Devil,  revelling  in  grotesque  humour, 
and  an  equally  real  Herod,  who  gave  free  play  to 
the  melodramatic  element  so  dear  to  the  unculti- 
vated in  every  age,  appeared  those  very  tenuous  and 
shadowy  abstractions,  the  World,  the  Flesh,  the 
Devil,  not  as  actors  in  the  world's  tragedy,  but  as 
personifications  of  the  principle  of  evil ;  with  Genus 
Humanum,  Pleasure,  Slander,  Perseverance,  and 
the  Seven  Deadly  Sins.  These  prolix  and  monot- 
onous plays  cover  a  wide  range  of  subjects,  from 
the  popular  "  Everyman,"  which  deals,  not  without 


i6 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


dignity,  with  the  supreme  experience  of  death,  to 
"Wyt  and  Science,"  which  doubtless,  on  many  ci 
school  stage,  set  forth  the  charms  of  knowledge,  ancl 
presented  one  of  the  earliest  pleas  for  athletics. 

The  Moralities  beguiled  the  darkest  period  in  the 
literary  history  of  England;  the  tide  of  the  first 
dramatic  energy  had  gone  out,  the  tide  of  the  second 


FOUR   MORALITY   PLAYERS. 

Contemplation,  Perseverance,  Imagination,  and  Free  Will.  —  From  a  black-letter  copy  of 
the  Morality  "  Hycke-Scorner." 

and  greater  dramatic  movement  had  not  set  in. 
There  were  freedom,  spontaneity,  fresh  feeling, 
poetic  imagery,  in  the  ballads ;  but  the  Moralities 
were  mechanical,  rigid,  laboured,  and  uninspired. 

The  Moralities  marked,  however,  one  important 
step  in  the  development  of  the  English  drama :  they 
created  opportunities  for  professional  actors,  and 
made  acting  as  a  profession  possible.  The  earlier 
plays  had  been  in  the  hands  of  amateurs ;  men  who 


THE   FORERUNNERS   OF    SHAKESPEARE  17 

had,  in  many  cases,  considerable  skill  in  acting,  but 
who  were  members  of  guilds,  with  other  and  differ- 
ent occupations.  Side  by  side  with  the  Mystery 
and  Miracle  plays  there  had  percolated  through  the 
long  period  when  the  English  drama  was  in  the 
making  many  kinds  of  shows,  more  or  less  coarse 
and  full  of  buffoonery,  in  the  hands  of  roving 
pantomimists,  singers,  comedians  —  a  class  without 
habitation,  standing,  or  character.  These  wander- 
ing performers,  many  of  them  doubtless  men  of 
genuine  gifts  cast  upon  an  unpropitious  time,  found 
place  at  this  period  in  companies  supported  by 
noblemen  and  attached  to  great  houses,  or  in  com- 
panies which  presented  plays  in  various  parts  of  the 
country  in  the  courts  of  inns  and,  on  great  occa- 
sions, in  large  towns  and  cities.  For  all  classes 
dearly  loved  the  bravery,  excitement,  and  diversion 
of  the  pageant,  the  masque,  and  the  play  of  every 
kind.  The  parts  were  entirely  in  the  hands  of 
men ;  no  woman  appeared  on  the  stage  until  after 
the  time  of  Shakespeare ;  the  female  characters 
were  taken  by  boys. 

The  transition  from  the  Moralities  to  the  fully 
developed  play  was  gradual,  and  was  not  marked  by 
logical  gradations.  The  tendency  to  allegory  gave 
place  slowly  to  the  tendency  to  character-drawing, 
to  the  unfolding  of  a  story,  and  to  the  humour  and 
liveliness  of  the  comedy.  One  of  the  earliest  forms 
which  comedy  took  was  the  Interlude  —  a  transi- 
tional dramatic  form  with,  which  the  name  of  John 


l8  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Heywood  is  identified.  A  London  boy,  believed  to 
have  sung  for  a  time  in  the  choir  of  the  Chapel 
Royal,  Heywood  studied  at  Oxford,  was  befriended 
by  that  great  Englishman,  Sir  Thomas  More,  and 
early  became  attached  to  the  Court  of  Henry  the 
Eighth  as  a  player.  Players  were  still  under  social 
and  religious  interdict,  but  Heywood's  sincerity  as  a 
Catholic  withstood  the  test  of  the  withdrawal  of  the 
royal  favour  at  a  time  when  a  king's  smile  was  for- 
tune in  a  most  tangible  form.  There  was  a  manly 
integrity  in  the  nature  of  John  Heywood,  as  in  that 
of  many  of  his  fellow-actors.  The  Interlude  in  his 
hands  was  less  ambitious  in  construction  than  a 
play;  shorter,  more  vivacious,  and  much  closer  to 
the  life  of  the  time.  It  was  often  rude,  but  it  was 
oftener  racy,  direct,  and  effective  in  expression ; 
using  the  familiar  colloquial  speech  of  the  day  with 
great  effectiveness.  The  interest  turned  on  a  hu- 
morous situation,  and  the  dialogue  was  enlivened 
by  the  play  of  shrewd  native  wit.  In  the  "  Four  P's  " 
the  characters  were  so  well  known  that  the  audience 
hardly  needed  the  stimulus  of  wit  to  awaken  its 
interest.  The  Palmer,  the  Poticary,  the  Pedlar,  and 
the  Pardoner  brought  the  playwright  and  his  audi- 
tors into  easy  and  immediate  contact,  and  furnished 
ample  opportunity  to  satirize  or  ridicule  the  vices, 
hypocrisies,  and  follies  of  the  time.  The  structure 
of  the  Interlude  was  simple,  and  its  wit  not  too  fine 
for  the  coarse  taste  of  the  time ;  but  it  was  a  true 
growth  of  the  English  soil,  free  from  foreign  influ- 


THE    FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE  19 

ence  ,  the  virility,  the  gayety,  and  the  license  of  the 
early  English  spirit  were  in  it. 

"  Ralph  Roister  Doister,"  the  earliest  comedy, 
was  produced  not  later  than  1550  —  perhaps 
twenty  years  after  the  production  of  the  "  Four 
P's."  Heywood  had  shown  how  to  set  character  in 
distinct  outlines  on  the  stage  ;  Nicholas  Udall,  an 
Oxford  student,  a  scholar,  holding  the  head-master- 
ship first  of  Eton  College  and  later  of  Westminster 
School,  brought  the  comedy  to  completeness  by 
adding  to  the  interest  of  characters  essentially 
humorous  the  more  absorbing  interest  of  a  well- 
defined  plot.  Udall  was  a  schoolmaster,  but  there 
was  no  pedantry  in  him ;  he  felt  the  deep  classical 
influence  which  had  swept  Europe  like  a  tide,  but 
he  took  his  materials  from  the  life  about  him,  and 
he  used  good  native  speech.  He  had  learned  from 
the  Latin  comedy  how  to  construct  both  a  plot  and 
a  play,  and  his  training  gave  him  easy  mastery  of 
sound  expression ;  but  he  composed  his  comedies 
in  terms  of  English  life.  "  Roister  Doister "  was 
a  type  of  man  instantly  recognized  by  an  English 
audience  of  every  social  grade ;  a  coward  who  was 
also  a  boaster,  whose  wooing,  like  that  of  Falstaff, 
affords  ample  opportunity  for  the  same  rollicking 
fun.  The  significance  of  the  piece  lay  in  its  fresh- 
ness, its  freedom,  and  its  ease  —  qualities  which 
were  prophetic  of  the  birth  of  a  true  drama. 

"  Gammer  Gurton's  Needle,"  a  broad,  coarse,  but 
effective  picture  of  rustic  manners,  generally  be- 


20 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


lieved  to  have  been  written  by  John  Still,  a  Lin- 
colnshire man  by  birth,  a  Cambridge  man  by 
education,  and  a  Bishop  by  vocation,  marks  the 
first  appearance  of  the  fully  developed  farce  in 
English,  and  is  notable  for  vigorous  characteriza- 
tion in  a  mass  of  vulgar  buffoonery.  That  such 
a  piece  should  come  from  the  hand  of  the  stern 
divine,  with  Puritan  aspect,  who  lies  at  rest  in 


THE  TALBOT   INN  —  CHAUCER'S    "TABARD." 
Where  the  early  players  often  raised  their  rude  stage. 

Wells  Cathedral,  and  that  it  was  performed  before 
a  college  audience  in  Cambridge,  shows  that  the 
social  and  intellectual  conditions  which  permitted 
so  close  a  juxtaposition  of  the  sacred  and  the  vul- 
gar in  the  Mystery  and  Miracle  plays  still  prevailed. 
The  saving  grace  of  this  early  dramatic  writing  was 
its  vitality;  in  this,  and  in  its  native  flavour  and  its 
resistance  to  foreign  influence,  lay  its  promise. 


THE   FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE  11 

The  earlier  development  of  comedy  as  compared 
with  tragedy  is  not  difficult  to  account  for.  Trag- 
edy exacts  something  from  an  audience ;  a  certain 
degree  of  seriousness  or  of  culture  must  be  pos- 
sessed by  those  who  are  to  enjoy  or  profit  by  it. 
Comedy,  on  the  other  hand,  appeals  to  the  un- 
trained no  less  than  the  trained  man  ;  it  collects 
its  audience  at  the  village  blacksmith's  or  the  coun- 
try shop  as  readily  as  in  the  most  amply  appointed 
theatre.  Moreover,  it  kept  close  to  popular  life 
and  taste  at  a  time  when  the  influence  of  the  classi- 
cal literatures  was  putting  its  impress  on  men  of 
taste  and  culture.  Italy,  by  virtue  of  its  immense 
service  in  the  recovery  of  classical  thought  and  art, 
and  in  the  production  of  great  works  of  its  own  in 
literature,  painting,  sculpture,  and  architecture,  was 
the  teacher  of  western  Europe ;  and  such  was  the 
splendour  of  her  achievements  that  what  ought  to 
have  been  a  liberating  and  inspiring  influence 
became  a  danger  to  native  originality  and  develop- 
ment. Italian  literature  came  into  England  like  a 
flood,  and,  through  a  host  of  translations,  some  of 
which  were  of  masterly  quality,  the  intellectual  in- 
equality of  a  difference  of  more  than  two  centuries 
in  culture  was  equalized  with  astonishing  rapidity. 
In  that  age  of  keen  appetite  for  knowledge,  the  art 
and  scholarship  of  a  more  mature  people  were  as- 
similated with  almost  magical  ease.  The  traditions 
of  the  classical  stage  for  a  time  threatened  the 
integrity  of  English  art,  but  in  the  end  the  vigour 


22  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

of  the  English  mind  asserted  itself;  if  the  classical 
influence  had  won  the  day,  Ben  Jonson  would  have 
secured  a  higher  place,  but  Shakespeare  might  have 
been  fatally  handicapped. 

"  Ferrex  and  Porrex,"  or,  as  the  play  is  more  gen- 
erally known,  "  Gorbordoc,"  was  the  earliest  English 
tragedy,  and  is  chiefly  interesting  as  showing  how 
the  influence  of  Seneca  and  the  sturdy  vigour  of  the 
English  genius  worked  together  in  a  kind  of  rude 
harmony.  The  manner  shows  the  Latin  influence, 
but  the  story  and  the  spirit  in  which  it  is  treated  are 
genuinely  English.  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  whose  cul- 
ture was  of  the  best  in  point  of  quality,  found  "  Gor- 
bordoc "  full  of  "  stately  speeches  and  well-sounding 
phrases,  climbing  to  the  height  of  Seneca  his  style," 
but  notes  the  failure  to  comply  with  the  traditional 
unity  of  time.  Sackville,  one  of  the  authors  of  this 
vigorous  play,  stood  in  relations  of  intimacy  with 
the  Court  of  Elizabeth,  became  Chancellor  of  the 
University  of  Oxford,  and  Lord  High  Treasurer  of 
England.  His  work  in  "  The  Mirrour  of  Magis- 
trates "  brings  out  still  more  clearly  the  deep  seri- 
ousness of  his  spirit.  Norton,  who  collaborated 
with  him  in  the  writing  of  "  Gorbordoc,"  was  a  man 
of  severe  temper,  a  translator  of  Calvin's  Institutes, 
and  a  bor^  reformer.  Such  men  might  be  affected 
by  the  classical  influence ;  they  could  hardly  be 
subdued  by  it.  In  the  excess  of  action,  the  rush  of 
incident,  the  swift  accumulation  of  horrors,  which 
characterize  this  sanguinary  play,  Seneca  would 


THE   FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE  23 

have  found  few  suggestions  of  his  own  methods  and 
temper.  The  blank  verse  in  which  it  is  written, 
however,  came  ultimately  from  Italy  through  the 
skilful  adaptation  of  Surrey. 

The  integrity  of  the  English  drama  was  assured 
when  the  playwrights,  now  rapidly  increasing  in 
numbers,  turned  to  English  history  and  produced 
the  long  series  of  Chronicle  plays,  to  which  Shake- 
speare owed  so  much,  and  which  furnished  an  inac- 
curate but  liberalizing  education  for  the  whole  body 
of  the  English  people.  In  these  plays,  probably  cov- 
ering the  entire  field  of  English  history,  the  doings 
and  the  experiences  of  the  English  race  were  set 
forth  in  the  most  vital  fashion ;  English  history  dra- 
matically presented  became  a  connected  and  living 
story.  They  developed  the  race  consciousness, 
deepened  the  race  feeling,  made  love  of  country  the 
passion  which  found  splendid  expression  in  "  Henry 
V.,"  and  prepared  the  way  for  the  popular  appre- 
ciation of  the  noblest  dramatic  works.  This  dra- 
matic use  of  national  history  made  the  drama  the 
natural  and  inevitable  expression  of  the  English 
spirit  in  Elizabeth's  time,  and  insured  an  art  which 
was  not  only  intensely  English  but  intensely  alive. 
The  imagination  trained  by  the  Chronicle  plays  was 
ready  to  understand  "  Hamlet "  and  "  Lear." 

Bale's  "  King  Johan,"  "  The  True  Tragedy  of 
Richard  III.,"  "The  Famous  Victories  of  Henry 
V.,"  "The  Contention  of  the  Two  Famous  Houses 
of  York  and  Lancaster,"  "  Edward  III.,"  and  kin- 


24  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

dred  plays,  not  only  furnished  material  for  Shake- 
speare's hand,  but  prepared  Shakespeare's  audiences 
to  understand  his  work.  These  plays  practically 
cover  a  period  of  four  centuries,  and  bring  the  story 
of  English  history  down  to  the  Armada. 

In  close  historical  connection  with  the  Chronicle 
plays  must  be  placed  the  long  list  of  plays  which, 
like  "Cardinal  Wolsey,"  "Duchess  of  Norfolk," 
"  Duke  Humphrey,"  and  "  Hotspur,"  drew  upon  the 
treasury  of  English  biography  and  dramatized  in- 
dividual vicissitude  and  fate ;  and  the  plays  which, 
like  the  "  Downfall  of  Robert  Earl  of  Huntington," 
developed  the  dramatic  uses  of  legendary  history. 
It  would  not  be  easy  to  devise  a  more  stimulating 
method  of  educating  the  imagination  and  prepar- 
ing the  way  for  a  period  of  free  and  buoyant 
creativeness  than  this  visualization  of  history  on 
the  rude  but  intensely  vitalized  stage  of  the  six- 
teenth century. 

One  more  step  in  this  vital  expression  of  the 
English  spirit  was  taken  by  Shakespeare's  immedi- 
ate predecessors  and  by  some  of  his  older  contem- 
poraries. Such  a  play  as  "Arden  of  Feversham," 
which  has  been  credited  to  Shakespeare  by  a 
number  of  critics,  brought  the  dramatic  form  to  a 
stage  where  it  needed  but  the  hand  of  a  poet  of 
genius  to  perfect  it.  There  was  still  a  long  dis- 
tance between  the  plays  of  this  period,  however, 
and  the  balance,  harmony,  and  restraint  of  Shake- 
speare. "  Arden  of  Feversham,"  and  a  host  of 


THE  FORERUNNERS   OF   SHAKESPEARE 


25 


dramas  of  the  same  period,  are  charged  with  power; 
but  he  who  reads  them  is  fed  with  horrors.  Lyly's 
comedies  were  acted,  with  one  or  two  exceptions, 
before  Queen  Elizabeth,  and  were  mainly,  as  Mr. 
Symonds  suggests,  elaborately  decorated  censers 
in  which  incense  was  lavishly  burned  to  a  Queen 
incredibly  avid  of  adulation  and  flattery.  As  a 


THE   GLOBE   THEATRE. 


writer  of  comedies  for  the  Court,  the  author  of 
"  Euphues  "  influenced  the  language  of  the  later 
dramatists  far  more  deeply  than  he  influenced  the 
drama  itself.  He  made  an  art  of  witty  dialogue, 
and  repartee  became  in  his  hands  a  brilliant  fence 
of  words  ;  it  remained  for  Shakespeare  to  carry 
both  to  perfection  in  "  Much  Ado  About  Nothing," 


26  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

When  Shakespeare  reached  London  about  1586, 
he  found  the  art  of  play-writing  in  the  hands  of  a 
group  of  men  of  immense  force  of  imagination  and 
of  singularly  varied  gifts  of  expression.  During  the 
decade  in  which  he  was  serving  his  apprenticeship 
to  his  art  England  lost  Peele,  Kyd,  Greene,  and 
Marlowe ;  Lodge,  having  become  a  physician,  died 
in  1625.  Every  member  of  this  group,  with  the 
exception  of  Marlowe,  was  born  to  good  conditions ; 
they  were  gentlemen  in  position,  and  scholars  by 
virtue  of  university  training.  They  were  careless 
and,  in  some  cases,  violent  and  criminal  livers;  men 
born  out  of  due  time,  so  far  as  adjustment  between 
genius  and  sound  conditions  was  concerned;  or 
committed  by  temperament  to  unbalanced,  dis- 
orderly, and  tragical  careers.  Greene,  after  a  life 
of  dissipation,  died  in  extreme  misery  of  mind 
and  body;  Peele  involved  himself  in  many  kinds 
of  misfortune,  and  became  the  victim  of  his  vices ; 
Nash  lived  long  enough  to  lament  the  waste  and 
confusion  of  his  career;  and  the  splendid  genius 
of  Marlowe  was  quenched  before  he  had  reached 
his  thirtieth  year.  He  who  would  pass  a  sweeping 
and  unqualified  condemnation  on  this  fatally  en- 
dowed group  of  ardent  young  writers  would  do 
well  to  study  the  times  in  which  they  lived,  the 
attitude  of  society  towards  the  playwright,  the 
absence  of  normal  conditions  for  the  expression  of 
genius  such  as  they  possessed,  and  the  perilous 
combination  of  temperament  and  imagination  which 


THE   FORERUNNERS    OF    SHAKESPEARE  27 

seems  to  have  been  made  in  each.  It  is  futile  and 
immoral  to  conceal  or  minimize  the  faults  and 
vices  of  men  of  genius ;  but  it  is  equally  futile 
and  immoral  to  attempt  to  determine  in  any  indi- 
vidual career  the  degree  of  moral  responsibility. 

Greene  was  a  born  story-teller,  without  having 
any  marked  gift  for  the  construction  of  strong  and 
well-elaborated  plots ;  his  study  of  character  was 
neither  vigorous  nor  convincing.  Nash  was,  on 
the  other  hand,  a  born  satirist,  with  a  coarse  but 
very  effective  method  and  a  humour  often  grotesque 
but  always  virile.  Peele  was  preeminently  a  poet 
of  taste,  with  a  gift  for  graceful  and  even  elegant 
expression,  a  touch  of  tenderness,  and  a  sensitive- 
ness of  imagination  which  showed  itself  in  his 
use  of  the  imagery  of  mythology.  Lodge  wrote 
dull  plays  and  lightened  them  by  the  introduction 
of  charming  songs. 

Marlowe  was  the  creative  spirit  of  this  group  of 
accomplished  playwrights.  The  son  of  a  Canter- 
bury shoemaker,  he  took  his  Bachelor's  degree  at 
Cambridge,  and  arrived  in  London,  "  a  boy  in  years, 
a  man  in  genius,  a  god  in  ambition."  His  ardent 
nature,  impatient  of  all  restraint  and  full  of  Titanic 
impulses,  found  congenial  society  on  the  stage  and 
congenial  work  in  play-writing.  His  life  was  as 
passionate  and  lawless  as  his  art;  his  plays  were 
written  in  six  turbulent  years,  and  his  career  was 
one  of  brief  but  concentrated  energy.  The  two 
parts  of  "  Tamburlaine,"  "  The  Massacre  at  Paris," 


28  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

"The  Jew  of  Malta,"  "Edward  II.,"  and  "  Dr 
Faustus,"  the  glowing  fragment  of  "  Hero  and 
Leander,"  and  a  few  short  compositions,  among 
them  the  exquisite  "  Come  live  with  me  and  be 
my  love,"  evidence  the  depth  and  splendour  of  Mar- 
lowe's genius  and  the  lack  of  balance  and  restraint 
in  his  art.  He  gave  English  tragedy  sublimity, 
intensity,  breadth,  and  order;  he  freed  blank  verse 
from  rigidity  and  mechanical  correctness,  and  gave 
it  the  freedom,  harmony,  variety  of  cadence,  and 
compelling  music  which  imposed  it  upon  all  later 
English  tragedy.  Neither  in  his  life  nor  in  his  art 
did  Marlowe  accept  the  inevitable  limitations  of 
human  power  in  action  and  in  creation ;  he  flung 
himself  passionately  against  the  immovable  barriers, 
and  grasped  at  the  impossible.  But  his  failures 
were  redeemed  by  superb  successes.  He  breathed 
the  breath  of  almost  superhuman  life  into  the  Eng- 
lish drama  both  as  regards  its  content  and  its  form ; 
for  he  was  even  greater  as  a  poet  than  as  a  drama- 
tist: 

.  .  .  his  raptures  were 
All  air  and  fire  .  .  . ; 
For  that  fine  madness  still  he  did  retain 
Which  rightly  should  possess  a  poet's  brain. 

He  left  but  a  single  step  to  be  taken  in  the  full 
unfolding  of  the  drama,  and  that  step  Shakespeare 
took :  the  step  from  the  Titan  to  the  Olympian. 


CHAPTER    II 

BIRTH    AND   BREEDING 

THE  charm  of  Stratford-on-Avon  is  twofold ;  it 
is  enfolded  by  some  of  the  loveliest  and  most  char- 
acteristic English  scenery,  and  it  is  the  home  of  the 
greatest  English  literary  tradition.  Lying  in  the 
very  heart  of  the  country,  it  seems  to  be  guarded 
as  a  place  sacred  to  the  memory  of  the  foremost 
man  of  expression  who  has  yet  appeared  among  the 
English-speaking  peoples.  It  has  become  a  town 
of  some  magnitude,  with  a  prosperous  trade  in  malt 
and  corn ;  but  its  importance  is  due  wholly  to  the 
fact  that  it  is  the  custodian  of  Shakespeare's  birth- 
place, of  the  school  in  which  he  was  trained,  of  the 
house  in  which  he  courted  Anne  Hathaway,  of  the 
ground  on  which  he  built  his  own  home,  and  of 
the  church  in  which  he  lies  buried.  The  place  is 
full  of  Shakespearean  associations ;  of  localities 
which  he  knew  in  the  years  of  his  dawning  intelli- 
gence, and  in  those  later  years  when  he  returned 
to  take  his  place  as  a  householder  and  citizen ;  the 
old  churches  with  which  as  a  child  he  was  familiar 
are  still  standing,  substantially  as  they  stood  at  the 
end  of  the  sixteenth  century ;  the  grammar  school 
still  teaches  the  boys  of  to-day  within  the  walls 

29 


30  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

that  listened  to  the  same  recitations  three  hundred 
years  ago ;  the  houses  of  his  children  and  friends 
are,  in  several  instances,  still  secure  from  the  de- 
structive hand  of  time  ;  there  are  still  wide  stretches 
of  sloping  hillside  shaded  by  the  ancient  Forest 
of  Arden ;  there  are  quaint  half-timbered  fronts 
upon  which  he  must  have  looked  ;  the  "  bank  where 
the  wild  thyme  blows  "  is  still  to  be  found  by  those 
who  know  the  foot-path  to  Shottery  and  the  road 
over  the  hill;  the  Warwickshire  landscape  has  the 
same  ripe  and  tender  beauty  which  Shakespeare 
knew;  and  the  Avon  flows  as  in  the  days  when  he 
heard  the  nightingales  singing  in  the  level  meadows 
across  the  river  from  the  church,  or  slipped  silently 
in  his  punt  through  the  mist  which  softly  veils  it 
on  summer  nights. 

When  Shakespeare  was  born,  on  April  twenty- 
second  or  twenty-third,  in  the  year  fifteen  hun- 
dred and  sixty-four,  Stratford  was  an  insignificant 
hamlet,  off  the  main  highways  of  travel,  although 
within  reach  of  important  towns  like  Coventry, 
and  of  stately  old  English  homes  like  Warwick 
and  Kenilworth  castles.  The  streets  were  nar- 
row, irregular,  and,  like  most  streets  in  most 
towns  in  that  unsanitary  age,  badly  kept  and 
of  an  evil  odour;  the  houses  were  set  among  gar- 
dens or  in  the  open,  with  picturesque  indiffer- 
ence to  modern  ideas  of  community  orderliness  ; 
the  black-oak  structure  showing  curious  designs  of 
triangles  and  squares  through  the  plaster.  Thatched 


BIRTH    AND    BREEDING  3! 

roofs,  projecting  gables,  rough  walls,  unpaved  lanes, 
foot-paths  through  the  fields,  the  long  front  of  the 
Guild  Hall  with  the  Grammar  School,  the  Guild 
Chapel,  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Trinity,  the  bridge 
across  the  Avon  built  by  Sir  Hugh  Clopton  in  the 
time  of  Henry  VII.,  made  up  the  picture  which 


AN    EARLY    DRAWING    OF    SHAKESPEARE'S    BIRTHPLACE. 

Shakespeare  saw  when  he  looked  upon  the  place 
of  his  birth.  On  High  Street,  when  he  came  back 
from  London  to  live  in  Stratford,  he  found,  not  far 
from  his  house  in  New  Place,  the  carved  half-tim- 
bered front  of  the  house  in  which  tradition  says  the 
mother  of  John  Harvard  was  born. 


32  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

The  population  of  Stratford  is  now  about  nine 
thousand;  in  1564  it  was  probably  less  than  fifteen 
hundred.  It  was  surrounded  by  fields  which  were 
sometimes  white  with  grain,  and  were  always,  in  the 
season,  touched  with  the  splendour  of  the  scarlet 
poppy.  The  villagers  were  sturdy  English  folk  with 
more  vigour  than  intelligence,  and  with  more  capa- 
city than  education.  Many  of  them  were  unable  to 
sign  their  own  names,  and  among  these  John  Shake- 
speare, the  father  of  the  poet,  has  sometimes  been 
included:  documents  exist,  however,  which  bear 
what  is  believed  to  be  his  signature.  There  was 
nothing  unusual  in  this  lack  of  literary  training ; 
comparatively  few  Englishmen  of  the  station  of 
John  Shakespeare  had  mastered,  in  that  period,  the 
art  of  writing.  Men  who  could  not  sign  their  own 
names  were  often  men  of  mark,  substance,  and 
ability. 

The  family  name  was  not  uncommon  in  War- 
wickshire, and  was  borne  by  a  good  yeoman  stock. 
When  John  Shakespeare  applied,  in  1596,  for  the 
right  to  use  a  coat  of  arms,  he  declared  that  Henry 
VII.  had  made  a  grant  of  lands  to  his  grandfather 
in  return  for  services  of  importance.  The  college 
of  heraldry  has  been  so  prolific  of  fictitious  geneal- 
ogies that  this  claim  is  open  to  suspicion ;  what 
is  certain  is  the  substantial  character  of  the  poet's 
ancestors,  their  long  residence  in  Warwickshire, 
and  the  fact  that  some  of  them  were  farmers,  land- 
renters,  and  land-owners.  The  grandfather  of  the 


BIRTH   AND    BREEDING  33 

poet  was  probably  Richard  Shakespeare,  a  farmer 
who  lived  within  easy  walking  distance  of  Stratford. 
John  Shakespeare  removed  to  Stratford  about  the 
middle  of  the  sixteenth  century,  and  became  a  trader 
in  all  manner  of  farm  produce.  Then,  as  now,  malt 
and  corn  were  staple  articles  of  commerce  in  Strat- 
ford ;  John  Shakespeare  dealt  in  these  and  in  wool, 
skins,  meat,  and  leather.  He  has  been  called  a 
glover  and  a  butcher ;  he  was  both,  and  had  several 
other  vocations  besides. 

Henley  Street  was  then  one  of  the  thoroughfares 
of  Stratford,  and  got  its  name  from  the  fact  that 
it  led  to  Henley-on-Avon,  a  market  town  of  local 
importance.  That  John  Shakespeare  was  an  active 
man  of  affairs,  with  a  keen  instinct  for  business,  if 
not  with  a  sound  judgment,  is  clear,  not  only  from 
the  variety  and  number  of  his  business  interests, 
but  from  the  frequency  of  the  suits  for  the  recovery 
of  small  debts  in  which  he  appeared.  His  early 
ventures  were  successful,  and  he  soon  became  a 
man  of  substance  and  influence.  His  prosperity 
was  increased  by  his  marriage,  in  1557,  to  Mary 
Arden,  the  youngest  daughter  of  a  well-to-do  farmer 
of  Wilmcote,  not  far  from  Stratford.  She  brought 
her  husband  a  house  and  fifty  acres  of  land,  some 
money,  and  other  forms  of  property.  During  the 
year  before  his  marriage  John  Shakespeare  had 
purchased  the  house,  with  a  garden,  in  Henley 
Street,  which  is  now  accepted  as  the  birthplace  of 
the  poet.  In  the  following  year  his  growing  influ- 


34 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


ence  was  evidencd  by  his  election  as  a  tester  of  the 
quality  of  bread  and  of  malt  liquors.  Various  pub- 
lic duties  were  devolved  upon  him.  He  was  elected 
a  burgess  or  member  of  the  town  council  ;  he 
became  a  chamberlain  of  the  borough ;  and  later 


* 


.*i      f 


SHAKESPEARE'S  BIRTH  RECORD. 

The  three  crosses  mark  the  line. 


was  advanced  to  the  highest  position  in  the  gift  of 
the  municipality,  that  of  Bailiff.  There  were  two 
daughters  who  died  in  infancy  ;  then  came  the 
first  son,  William,  who  was  christened,  the  parish 
register  tells  us,  on  the  26th  day  of  April,  1564. 
The  custom  of  the  time  with  regard  to  the  interval 


BIRTH    AND    BREEDING 


35 


between  birth  and  baptism  was  so  well  settled  that 
there  seems  no  reason  to  doubt  that  the  poet  was 
born  on  the  22d  or  23d  of  the  month.  There  were 
then  two  detached  houses  standing  in  Henley 
Street  where  the  present  house  now  stands ;  tradi- 
tion assigns  the  house  to  the  west  as  the  place  of 
the  poet's  birth.  This  house  finally  came  into  the 
possession,  by  the  bequest  of  the  poet's  grand- 
daughter, of  the  family  of 
his  sister  Joan  Hart,  and 
until  1806  was  occupied  by 
them  ;  the  adjoining  house 
to  the  east  was  let  as  an  inn. 
In  1846  both  houses  were 
secured  for  preservation,  re- 
stored as  far  as  possible  to 
the  condition  in  which  they 
were  in  the  poet's  time, 
joined  in  a  single  structure, 
and  made  one  of  the  most 
interesting  museums  in  the 

World.          In     this     Structure  FONT  ]N  TRINITY  CHURCH,  WHERE 

SHAKESPEARE   WAS   BAPTIZED. 

there  is  every  reason  to  be- 
lieve that  Shakespeare  was  born.  The  continued 
possession  of  the  part  which  was  once  the  western 
house  by  the  poet's  kinsfolk  was  probably  the  basis 
for  a  tradition  which  runs  back  for  an  indefinite 
period. 

The  Birthplace,  as  it  is  called,  is  a  cottage  of  plas- 
ter and  timber,  two  stories  in  height,  with  dormer 


36  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

windows,  and  a  pleasant  garden  in  the  rear  —  all 
that  remains  of  a  considerable  piece  of  land.  It 
stands  upon  the  street,  and  the  visitor  passes  at 
once,  through  a  little  porch,  into  a  low  room,  ceiled 
with  black  oak,  paved  with  flags,  and  with  a  fire- 
place so  wide  that  one  sees  at  a  glance  what  the 
chimney-corner  once  meant  of  comfort  and  cheer. 
On  those  seats,  looking  into  the  glowing  fire,  the 
imagination  of  a  boy  could  hardly  fail  to  kindle. 
A  dark  and  narrow  stair  leads  to  the  little  bare 
room  on  the  floor  above  in  which  Shakespeare  was 
probably  born.  The  place  seems  fitted,  by  its  very 
simplicity,  to  serve  as  the  starting-point  for  so 
great  a  career.  There  is  a  small  fireplace ;  the 
low  ceiling  is  within  reach  of  the  hand ;  on  the  nar- 
row panes  of  glass  which  fill  the  casement  names 
and  initials  are  traced  in  irregular  profusion.  This 
room  has  been  a  place  eagerly  sought  by  literary 
pilgrims  since  the  beginning  of  the  century.  The 
low  ceiling  and  the  walls  were  covered,  in  the  early 
part  of  the  century,  with  innumerable  autographs. 
In  1820  the  occupant,  a  woman  who  attached  great 
importance  to  the  privilege  of  showing  the  house  to 
visitors,  was  compelled  to  give  up  that  privilege, 
and,  by  way  of  revenge,  removed  the  furniture  and 
whitewashed  the  walls  of  the  house.  A  part  of  the 
wall  of  the  upper  room  escaped  the  sacrilegious 
hand  of  the  jealous  custodian,  and  names  running 
back  to  the  third  decade  of  the  last  century  are 
still  to  be  found  there.  *  Other  and  perhaps  more 


BIRTH   AND   BREEDING  37 

famous  names  have  taken  the  places  of  those  which 
were  erased,  and  the  walls  are  now  a  mass  of  hiero- 
glyphs. Scott,  Byron,  Rogers,  Tennyson,  Thack- 
eray, Dickens,  have  left  this  record  of  their  interest 
in  the  room.  No  new  names  are  now  written  on 
these  blackened  walls ;  the  names  of  visitors  are 
kept  in  a  record-book  on  the  lower  floor. 


THE   ROOM    IN   WHICH    SHAKESPEARE   WAS   BORN. 

In  a  small  room  behind  the  birth-room  what  is 
known  as  the  Stratford  portrait  of  the  poet  is 
shown.  On  the  first  floor,  opening  from  the  room 
into  which  the  visitor  enters,  is  a  larger  room  in 
which  are  collected  a  number  of  very  interesting- 
articles  connected  with  the  poet.  There  are  to  be 
seen  the  deed  which  conveyed  the  property  to  his 
father;  the  letter  in  which  Richard  Quiney,  whose 


38  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

son  Thomas  married  the  poet's  youngest  daughter, 
Judith,  in  1616,  asked  him  for  a  loan  of  money;  the 
seal  ring  on  which  the  letters  W.  S.  are  engraved ; 
the  desk  which  stood  in  the  Grammar  School  three 
hundred  years  ago ;  and  many  other  curiosities, 
memorials,  documents,  and  books  which  find  proper 
place  in  such  a  museum.  In  the  garden,  sweet  with 
the  fragrant  breath  of  summer,  there  are  pansies 


A   BIT   OF   THE    WALL   OF   THE    ROOM    IN    WHICH    SHAKESPEARE   WAS   BORN. 

and  violets,  columbines  and  rosemary,  daisies  and 
rue  —  flowers  which  seem  to  belong  to  Shake- 
speare, since  they  bloom  in  the  plays  as  if  they  first 
struck  root  in  the  rich  soil  of  his  imagination.  This 
property,  which  remained  continuously  in  the  pos- 
session of  Shakespeare's  kin  until  the  beginning  of 
the  present  century,  is  now  set  apart  forever,  with 
the  home  of  Anne  Hathaway,  the  ground  which  the 


BIRTH   AND   BREEDING  39 

poet  purchased  in  1597,  and  where  he  built  his  own 
home,  and  the  adjoining  house,  as  memorials  of  the 
poet's  life  in  Stratford. 

John  Shakespeare  prospered  in  private  fortune 
and  in  public  advancement  for  nearly  a  decade 
after  the  birth  of  the  poet.  His  means  were  very 
considerable  for  the  time  and  place,  and  as  Bailiff 
and  chief  Alderman  he  was  the  civic  head  of  the 
community.  An  ingenious  attempt  has  been  made 
to  prove  that  he  was  a  man  of  Puritan  temper  and 
associations ;  but  the  fact  that  he  applied  for  a  grant 
of  arms,  and  that  as  Bailiff  he  welcomed  the  actors 
of  the  Earl  of  Worcester's  Company  and  the  Queen's 
Company  to  Stratford  in  1568,  would  seem  to  indi- 
cate that,  whatever  his  religious  convictions  and 
ecclesiastical  tendencies  may  have  been,  he  did  not 
share  the  fanatical  temper  of  some  of  his  con- 
temporaries. 

The  child  William,  then  four  years  old,  may  have 
seen  these  companies,  bravely  dressed,  with  banners 
flying,  drums  beating,  and  trumpeters  sounding 
their  ringing  tones,  riding  over  Clopton  bridge  and 
halting  in  the  market-place  where  High  and  Bridge 
Streets  intersect,  and  where  the  market,  with  its 
belfry  and  clock,  now  stands.  The  players  of  the 
day  led  a  wandering  life,  full  of  vicissitude,  but,  in 
fair  weather  and  a  hospitable  community,  they 
brought  with  them  a  visible  if  sometimes  shabby 
suggestion  of  the  great  London  world,  which  made 
their  occasional  coming  into  a  quiet  town  like  Strat- 


40  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

ford  an  unforgettable  occurrence.  The  horses  they 
rode  were  gayly  caparisoned,  the  banners  they 
carried  were  splendidly  emblazoned  with  the  arms 
of  their  patrons,  their  costumes  were  rich  and 
varied,  and  they  were  accompanied  by  grooms  and 
servants  of  all  sorts.  A  goodly  company  they  must 
have  seemed  to  a  child's  imagination,  with  an  air 
of  easy  opulence  worn  as  a  part  of  their  vocation, 
but  as  purely  imitative  as  the  parts  they  played  to 
crowds  of  open-mouthed  rustics.  Their  magnifi- 
cence, however  shabby,  and  their  brave  air,  however 
swaggering,  made  rural  England  feel  as  if  it  had 
touched  the  great  new  world  of  adventure  and  fame 
and  wealth,  of  which  stories  were  told  in  every 
chimney  corner. 

To  these  companies  of  players  Stratford  appears 
to  have  given  exceptional  hospitality ;  the  people 
of  the  place  were  lovers  of  the  drama.  In  the 
course  of  two  decades  the  town  enjoyed  no  less 
than  twenty-four  visits  from  strolling  companies  ; 
a  fact  of  very  obvious  bearing  on  the  education  of 
Shakespeare's  imagination  and  the  bent  of  his  mind 
toward  a  vocation.  In  such  a  community  there 
must  have  been  constant  talk  about  plays  and 
players,  and  easy  familiarity  with  the  resources  and 
art  of  the  actor.  It  follows,  too,  that  the  presence 
of  so  many  players  in  the  little  village  brought  boys 
of  an  inquiring  turn  of  mind  into  personal  contact 
with  the  comedians  and  tragedians  of  the  day.  As 
a  boy,  Shakespeare  came  to  know  the  old  English 


BIRTH    AND   BREEDING  41 

plays  which  were  the  stock  in  trade  of  the  travelling 
companies ;  he  learned  the  stage  business,  and  he 
was  undoubtedly  on  terms  of  familiarity  with  men 
of  gift  and  art.  For  the  purposes  of  his  future 
work  this  education  was  far  more  stimulating  and 
formative  than  any  which  he  could  have  secured 
at  Eton  or  Winchester  during  the  same  impres- 
sionable years.  Scott's  specific  training  for  the 
writing  of  the  Waverley  novels  and  the  narrative 
poems  which  bear  his  name  was  gained  in  his 
ardent  reading  and  hearing  of  old  Scotch  ballads, 
romances,  stories,  and  history,  rather  than  in  the 
lecture-rooms  of  the  University  of  Edinburgh. 
Shakespeare  has  sometimes  been  represented  as 
a  boy  of  obscure  parentage  and  vulgar  surround- 
ings ;  he  was,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  son  of  a  man 
of  energy  and  substance,  the  foremost  citizen  of 
Stratford.  He  has  often  been  represented  as  wholly 
lacking  educational  opportunities ;  he  was,  as  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  especially  fortunate  in  educational  oppor- 
tunities of  the  most  fertilizing  and  stimulating  kind. 
The  singular  misconception  which  has  identified 
education  exclusively  with  formal  academic  training 
has  made  it  possible  to  hold  men  of  the  genius  of 
Shakespeare,  Burns,  and  Lincoln  before  the  world 
as  exceptions  to  the  law  that  no  art  can  be  mastered 
save  through  a  thorough  educational  process.  If 
Burns  and  Lincoln  were  not  so  near  us,  the  author- 
ship of  "  Tarn  o'  Shanter "  and  the  Gettysburg 
address  would  have  been  challenged  on  the  ground 


42  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

of  inadequate  preparation  for  such  masterpieces  of 
expression. 

These  three  masters  of  speech  were  exceptionally 
well  educated  for  their  art,  for  no  man  becomes  an 
artist  except  by  the  way  of  apprenticeship ;  but 
their  education  was  individual  rather  than  formal, 
and  liberating  rather  than  disciplinary.  The  two 
poets  were  saturated  in  the  most  sensitive  period 
in  the  unfolding  of  the  imagination  with  the  very 
genius  of  the  people  among  whom  they  were  to 
work  and  whose  deepest  instincts  they  were  to 
interpret.  Their  supreme  good  fortune  lay  in 
the  fact  that  they  were  educated  through  the 
imagination  rather  than  through  the  memory 
and  the  rationalizing  faculties.  A  man  some- 
times gets  this  kind  of  education  in  the  schools, 
but  he  oftener  misses  it.  He  is  always  supremely 
fortunate  if  he  gets  it  at  all.  Shakespeare  re- 
ceived it  from  several  sources  ;  one  of  them 
be,ing  the  love  of  the  drama  in  the  town  in 
which  he  was  born,  access  to  its  records  of  every 
sort,  and  acquaintanceship  with  the  custodians 
of  its  traditions  and  the  practitioners  of  its 
art. 

But  he  was  by  no  means  lacking  in  educational 
opportunities  of  a  formal  kind.  The  Grammar 
School  on  Church  Street,  adjoining  the  Guild 
Chapel  and  across  Chapel  Lane  from  the  site  of 
the  poet's  later  home,  one  of  the  oldest  and  most 


BIRTH    AND    BREEDING 


43 


picturesque  buildings  now  standing  in  Stratford, 
was  founded  at  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century. 
It  was  part  of  an  older  religious  foundation,  of 
which  the  Chapel  still  remains,  and  which  once 
included  a  hospital.  After  passing  through  many 
vicissitudes,  the  school  was  reconstituted  in  the 
time  of  Edward  VI.  The  Chapel  was  used  in  con- 
nection with  it,  and,  if  tradition  is  to  be  accepted, 


LATIN    ROOM,    GRAMMAR   SCHOOL,    STRATFORD. 

was  occasionally  employed  for  school  purposes. 
It  was  built  about  the  middle  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  and  is  a  characteristic  bit  of  the  England 
which  Shakespeare  saw.  The  low,  square  tower 
must  have  been  one  of  the  most  familiar  landmarks 
of  Stratford  in  his  eyes.  He  saw  it  when  he  came, 
a  schoolboy,  from  his  father's  house  in  Henley 
Street,  and  turned  into  High  Street ;  and  from  his 
own  home  at  New  Place  he  must  have  looked  at 


44  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

it  from  all  his  southern  windows.  The  interior 
of  the  Chapel  has  suffered  many  things  at  the 
hands  of  iconoclasts  and  restorers,  but  remains 
substantially  as  Shakespeare  knew  it.  The  low 
ceilings  and  old  furnishings  of  the  Grammar  School, 
blackened  with  time,  make  one  aware,  like  the 
much  initialed  and  defaced  forms  in  the  older 
rooms  at  Eton,  that  education  in  England  has  a 
long  history. 

In  Shakespeare's  time  the  Renaissance  influence 
was  at  its  height,  and  the  schools  were  bearing  the 
fruits  of  the  new  learning.  Education  was  essen- 
tially literary,  and  dealt  almost  exclusively  with  the 
humanities.  Greek  was  probably  within  reach  of 
boys  of  exceptional  promise  as  students ;  but  Latin 
was  every  boy's  daily  food.  With  Plautus  and 
Terence,  the  masters  of  Latin  comedy,  with  Ovid, 
Virgil,  and  Horace,  the  masters  of  Latin  poetry, 
with  Cicero  the  orator  and  Seneca  the  moralist, 
Shakespeare  made  early  acquaintance.  When  Sir 
Hugh  Evans,  in  the  "  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor," 
listens  to  the  recitation,  so  familiar  to  all  boys  of 
English  blood,  of  Hie,  Htzc,  Hoc,  we  are  doubtless 
sharing  a  reminiscence  of  the  poet's  school  days. 
The  study  of  grammar  and  the  practice  of  con- 
versation prepared  the  way  for  the  reading  of  the 
classic  writers,  and  furnished  an  education  which 
was  not  only  disciplinary  but  invigorating.  With- 
out being  in  any  sense  a  scholar,  there  is  abundant 
evidence  that  Shakespeare  knew  other  languages 


BIRTH    AND    BREEDING 


45 


and  literatures  than  his  own.  His  knowledge 
was  of  the  kind  which  a  man  of  his  quality  of 
mind  and  educational  opportunities  might  be  ex- 
pected to  possess.  It  was  entirely  subordinate  to 
the  end  of  furnishing  the  material  he  wished  to 


THE   APPROACH   TO    HOLY   TRINITY   CHURCH. 

Use ;  it  was  vital  rather  than  exact ;  it  was  used 
freely,  without  any  pretension  to  thoroughness ;  it 
served  immediate  ends  with  the  highest  intelli- 
gence, and  is  inaccurate  with  the  indifference  of 
a  poet  who  was  more  concerned  with  the  sort  of 


46  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

life  led  in  Bohemia  than  with  its  boundary  lines. 
The  great  artists  have  been  noted  for  their  insight 
rather  than  their  accuracy ;  not  because  they  have 
been  untrained,  but  because  they  have  used  facts 
simply  to  get  at  truth.  Shakespeare  could  be  as 
accurate  as  a  scientist  when  exactness  served  his 
purpose,  as  the  description  of  the  Dover  Cliff  in 
"  King  Lear  "  shows. 

In  the  plays  there  are  recurring  evidences  that 
the  poet  knew  Virgil  and  Ovid,  and  had  not  for- 
gotten Lily's  grammar  and  the  "  Sententiae  Pue- 
riles,"  which  the  schoolboys  of  his  time  committed 
to  memory  as  a  matter  of  course.  In  a  number 
of  instances  he  used  the  substance  of  French  and 
Italian  books  of  which  English  translations  had 
not  been  made  in  his  time.  The  command  of 
French  and  Italian  for  reading  purposes,  to  a  boy 
of  Shakespeare's  quickness  of  mind  and  power  of 
rapid  assimilation,  with  his  knowledge  of  Latin 
and  the  widespread  interest  among  men  of  his 
class  in  the  literature  of  both  countries,  was  easily 
acquired.  It  must  be  remembered  that  for  thirty 
years  Shakespeare  was  on  intimate  terms  with 
men  of  scholarly  tastes  and  acquirements.  The 
most  splendid  tribute  among  the  many  which  he 
received  from  his  contemporaries  came  from  the 
most  thoroughly  trained  of  his  fellow-dramatists ; 
one  who  stood  preeminently  for  the  classical  tra- 
dition in  the  English  drama.  Shakespeare  was 
neither  by  instinct  nor  opportunity  a  scholar  in 


BIRTH   AND    BREEDING  47 

the  sense  in  which  Ben  Jonson  was  a  scholar;  but 
he  had  considerable  familiarity  with  four  languages; 
he  had  access  to  many  books ;  he  had  read  some 
of  them  with  the  most  vital  insight ;  and  he  was 
exceptionally  well  informed  in  many  directions. 

He  knew  something  of  law,  medicine,  theology, 
history,  trade ;  and  this  knowledge,  easily  acquired, 
was  readily  used  for  purposes  of  illustration ;  some- 
times used  inaccurately  as  regards  details,  as  men 
of  imagination  have  used  knowledge  in  all  times 
and  are  using  it  to-day ;  but  used  always  with 
divination  of  its  spiritual  or  artistic .  significance. 
A  careful  study  of  Shakespeare's  opportunities 
and  a  little  common  sense  in  reckoning  with  his 
genius  will  dissipate  the  confusion  of  mind  which 
has  made  it  possible  to  regard  him  as  uneducated 
and  therefore  incapable  of  writing  his  own  works. 
Aubrey's  statement  that  "he  understood  Latin 
pretty  well  "  is  abundantly  verified  by  the  plays ; 
they  also  furnish  evidence  that  he  understood 
Italian  and  French. 

That  he  studied  the  Bible,  either  in  the  Genevan 
version  or  in  the  revision  of  1568,  is  equally  appar- 
ent. His  references  to  incidents  in  Biblical  history 
and  his  use  of  Biblical  phrases  suggest  a  familiarity 
acquired  in  boyhood  rather  than  a  habit  of  read- 
ing in  maturity.  The  direct  suggestions  of  the 
influence  of  the  Bible  are  numerous ;  but  there  is 
also  the  impression  of  a  rich  and  frequent  use  of 
Biblical  wisdom  and  imagery.  Mr.  Locke  Rich- 


48 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


ardson  has  suggested  that  when  Falstaff  "  babbled 
of  green  fields "  his  memory  was  going  back  to 
the  days  when,  as  a  schoolboy,  the  Twenty-third 
Psalm  was  often  in  his  ears  or  on  his  lips;  and 
there  are  many  places  in  the  plays  where  Shake- 
speare seems  to  be  remembering  something  which 
he  learned  from  the  Bible  in  youth.  No  collec- 
tion of  books  could  have  brought  him  richer 


THE   GUILD    CHAMBER    IN    THE   GRAMMAR   SCHOOL. 

material  for  his  view  of    life    and  for  his   art,  noj 
only  as   regards  its  content  but  its  form. 

The  Grammar  School,  in  which  Cicero  and 
Virgil  have  been  taught  in  unbroken  succession 
since  Shakespeare's  time,  was  a  free  school,  taking 
boys  of  the  neighbourhood  from  seven  years  up- 
wards, and  keeping  them  on  the  benches  with  gen- 
erous disregard  of  hours.  There  were  holidays, 
however,  and  there  was  time  for  punting  on  the 


BIRTH   AND    BREEDING  49 

river,  for  rambles  across  country,  and  for  those 
noisy  games,  prolonged  far  into  the  evening  by  the 
long  English  twilight,  which  make  the  meadows 
across  the  Avon  as  vocal  as  the  old  graveyard  about 
the  church  is  reposeful  and  silent. 

Boys  in  Shakespeare's  station  in  life  rarely  went 
to  school  after  their  fourteenth  year,  and  the  grow- 
ing financial  embarrassments  of  John  Shakespeare 
probably  took  his  son  out  of  the  Grammar  School 
a  year  earlier.  The  tide  of  prosperity  had  begun 
to  recede  from  the  active  trader  some  time  earlier; 
whether  his  declining  fortunes  were  due  to  lack  of 
judgment  or  to  the  accidents  of  a  business  career 
it  is  impossible  to  determine.  It  is  clear  that  he 
was  a  man  of  energy  and  versatility  ;  that  he  was 
successful  at  an  unusually  early  age  and  in  an 
unusual  degree ;  and  that  later,  for  a  time  at  least, 
he  was  overtaken  by  adversity.  In  1578,  when  the 
poet  was  fourteen  years  old,  John  Shakespeare 
mortgaged  his  wife's  property  at  Wilmcote  for  the 
sum  of  forty  pounds,  or  about  two  hundred  dollars 
—  the  equivalent  of  more  than  a  thousand  dollars 
in  present  values.  In  the  following  year  another 
piece  of  property  at  Snitterfield  was  disposed  of  for 
the  same  amount.  Unsatisfied  or  dissatisfied  credi- 
tors began  to  bring  suits ;  taxes  went  unpaid ;  other 
properties  were  sold  without  arresting  the  down- 
ward movement;  in  1586,  when  the  poet  went  up 
to  London  to  seek  his  fortune,  John  Shakespeare 
had  ceased  to  attend  the  meetings  at  Guild  Hall, 


50  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

and  lost  his  right  to  wear  the  Alderman's  gown  in 
consequence ;  later  his  goods  were  seized  by  legal 
process  and  warrants  for  his  arrest  as  an  insolvent 
debtor  were  issued.  There  is  a  story  of  a  consider- 
able loss  through  the  generous  act  of  standing  as 
surety  for  a  brother;  and  it  is  known  that  there 


GUY'S   CLIFF   AND   THE   AVON. 
From  an  old  print. 


was,  during   these   years,  great  distress  in  several 
branches  of  trade   in  Warwickshire. 

If  it  cost  nothing  to  send  a  boy  to  the  Grammar 
School,  it  cost  something  to  keep  him  there ;  and 
by  the  withdrawal  of  his  son  when  losses  began  to 
press  heavily  upon  him  John  Shakespeare  may  not 
only  have  cut  off  one  source  of  his  expense,  but 


BIRTH   AND   BREEDING  51 

gained  some  small  addition  to  his  income  from  the 
industry  of  another  wage-earner  in  the  family. 
After  leaving  school  the  son  may  have  assisted  his 
father,  as  Aubrey  reports,  or  he  may  have  entered 
the  office  of  a  lawyer,  as  a  contemporary  allusion 
seems  to  affirm ;  nothing  definite  is  known  about 
his  occupations  between  his  fourteenth  and  eigh- 
teenth years.  There  is  no  reason  why  anything 
should  have  been  remembered  or  recorded ;  he  was 
an  obscure  boy  living  in  an  inland  village,  before 
the  age  of  newspapers,  and  out  of  relation  with 
people  of  fashion  or  culture.  During  this  period 
as  little  is  known  of  him  as  is  known  of  Cromwell 
during  the  same  period ;  as  little,  but  no  less.  This 
fact  gives  no  occasion  either  for  surprise  or  scepti- 
cism as  to  his  marvellous  genius ;  it  was  an  entirely 
normal  fact  concerning  boys  growing  up  in  unliter- 
ary  times  and  rural  communities.  That  these  boys 
subsequently  became  famous  does  not  change  the 
conditions  under  which  they  grew  up. 


CHAPTER    III 

SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY 

THE  England  of  Shakespeare's  boyhood  and 
youth  was  not  only  dramatic  in  feeling  but  spec- 
tacular in  form ;  the  Queen  delighted  in  those 
gorgeous  pageants  which  symbolized  by  their 
splendour  the  greatness  of  her  place  and  the  dignity 
of  her  person.  Her  vigorous  Tudor  temper  was 
thrown  into  bold  relief  by  her  intensely  feminine 
craving  for  personal  loyalty  and  admiration.  One 
of  the  keenest  and  most  adroit  politicians  of  her 
time,  her  instincts  as  a  woman  were  sometimes 
postponed  to  the  exigencies  of  the  State,  but  they 
were  as  imperious  as  her  temper.  Denied  as  Queen 
the  personal  devotion  which  as  a  woman  she  craved, 
she  fed  her  unsatisfied  imagination  on  flattery  and 
imposing  ceremonies.  In  the  summer  of  1575, 
when  Shakespeare  was  in  his  twelfth  year,  the 
Queen  made  that  memorable  visit  to  Kenilworth 
Castle  which  has  found  its  record  in  Scott's  brill- 
iant novel.  Four  years  earlier,  the  royal  presence 
at  Charlecote  (Sir  Thomas  Lucy,  the  future  Justice 
Shallow,  playing  the  part  of  host)  had  brought  the 
Court  into  the  immediate'neighbourhood  of  Stratford. 

52 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  53 

Kenilworth  is  fifteen  miles  distant,  but  the  magnifi- 
cent pageants  and  stately  ceremonies  with  which 
Leicester  welcomed  the  Queen  were  matters  of  gen- 
eral talk  throughout  Warwickshire  long  before  the 
arrival  of  Elizabeth. 

The  Queen's  visit  was  made  in  July,  when  nature 
supplemented  with  lavish  beauty  all  the  various 
art  and  immense  wealth  which  Leicester  freely 
drew  upon  for  the  entertainment  of  his  capricious 
and  exacting  mistress.  Pageants  and  diversions  of 
every  kind  succeeded  one  another  in  bewildering 
variety  for  ten  days.  The  Queen  was  addressed 
by  sibyls,  by  giants  of  Arthur's  age,  by  the  Lady  of 
the  Lake,  by  Pomona,  Ceres,  and  Bacchus.  There 
was  a  rustic  marriage  for  her  entertainment,  and 
a  mock  fight  representing  the  defeat  of  the  Danes. 
Returning  from  the  chase,  Triton  rose  out  of  the 
lake  and,  in  Neptune's  name,  prayed  for  her  help 
to  deliver  an  enchanted  lady  pursued  by  a  cruel 
knight ;  and  straightway  the  lady  herself  appeared, 
with  an  escort  of  nymphs;  Proteus,  riding  a  dolphin, 
following  close  behind.  Then,  suddenly,  from  the 
heart  of  the  dolphin,  a  chorus  of  ocean  deities  sang 
the  praises  of  the  great  and  beautiful  Queen.  The 
tension  of  these  splendid  mythological  and  alle- 
gorical pageants  was  relieved  by  the  tricks  of  necro- 
mancers, the  feats  of  acrobats,  and  by  fights  between 
dogs  and  bears.  The  prodigality,  semi-barbaric 
taste,  and  magnificence  of  the  age  were  illustrated 
for  a  royal  spectator  with  more  than  royal  lavishness. 


54 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


On  a  summer  day  the  way  from  Stratford  to  the 
Castle  lies  through  a  landscape  touched  with  the 
ripest  beauty  of  England  ;  a  beauty  not  only  of  line 
and  structure,  but  of  depth  and  richness  of  foliage, 
of  ancient  places  slowly  transformed  by  the  tender 
and  patient  and  pious  care  of  centuries  of  growth 

into  masses  of 
greenness  so  afflu- 
ent and  of  such 
depth  that  it 
seems  as  if  foun- 
tains of  life  had 


overflowed 


great 
foliage. 
The 


masses 


into 
of 


QUEEN    ELIZABETH. 


summer 
days  were  doubt- 
less long  and 
wearisome  to  the 
boys  in  the  Gram- 
mar School  in 
the  quiet  village. 
The  nightingale 
had  ceased  to  sing  along  the  Avon;  the  fragrance 
was  gone  from  the  hedges  with  their  blossoms; 
midsummer  was  at  its  height ;  there  was  the  smell 
of  the  new-cut  grass  in  the  meadows,  touched  here 
and  there  with  the  glory  of  the  scarlet  poppy. 
Whether  the  coming  of  the  Queen  was  made  the 
occasion  of  granting  a  holiday  it  is  much  too  late  to 


SHAKESPEARE'S    COUNTRY  55 

assert  or  deny ;  that  the  more  adventurous  took  one 
is  more  than  probable.  In  those  days  even  the 
splendour  of  the  wandering  players  paled  before 
that  of  the  Queen.  She  had  been  seventeen  years 
on  the  throne.  She  had  all  the  qualities  of  her  fam- 
ily :  the  Tudor  imperiousness  of  temper,  and  the 
Tudor  instinct  for  understanding  her  people  and 
winning  them.  The  Armada  was  thirteen  years  in 
the  future,  and  the  full  splendour  of  a  great  reign 
was  still  to  come ;  but  there  was  something  in  the 
young  Queen  which  had  already  touched  the 
imagination  of  England;  something  in  her  spirit 
and  bearing  which  saved  the  poets  of  the  time  from 
being  mere  flatterers.  Elizabeth  was  neither  beauti- 
ful nor  gracious  ;  the  romantic  charm  which  cap- 
tivated all  who  came  into  the  presence  of  her 
unhappy  contemporary  Mary  Stuart  was  not  in  her. 
But  what  she  lacked  as  woman  she  easily  possessed 
as  queen ;  she  had  the  rare  gift  of  personifying  her 
rank  and  place.  The  sense  of  sovereignty  went 
with  her.  In  a  time  of  passionate  energy  and  lust 
of  life  she  was  not  only  the  centre  of  organized 
society,  but  the  symbol  of  unlimited  opportunity, 
fortune,  and  greatness. 

Where  the  Queen  was,  there  was  England ;  she 
was  not  only  its  ruler,  but  the  personification  of  its 
vitality  and  force.  When  she  came  into  Warwick- 
shire, the  whole  country  was  stirred  with  the  sense 
of  the  presence  of  something  splendid  and  signifi- 
cant. Stories  of  the  preparations  at  the  Castle  had 


56  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

been  carried  by  word  of  mouth  across  the  country- 
side. There  were  no  newspapers ;  no  means  of 
rapid  communication  with  the  outer  world ;  there 
were,  for  the  vast  majority  of  people,  no  books ; 
most  men  never  went  out  of  their  native  shires; 
travellers  from  a  distance  were  few.  Tales  of 
Leicester's  honours  and  emoluments  were  told  and 
listened  to  like  modern  fairy  stories ;  his  rapid 
advancement  lent  a  kind  of  magic  to  the  splendour 
of  his  state ;  and  the  Queen  was  the  magician 
whose  touch  made  and  marred  all  fortunes.  In  the 
time  of  Elizabeth  as  in  that  of  Victoria,  the  Queen 
personified  the  English  State  and  the  majesty  of 
the  English  race.  Through  this  kind  of  symbol- 
ism a  deep  and  formative  educational  influence  has 
been  silently  put  forth  and  unconsciously  received. 
The  Queen  was  in  many  ways  the  incarnation  of 
the  spirit  of  Shakespeare's  time,  and  her  coming  into 
Warwickshire  was  like  the  advent  of  the  world-ele- 
ment into  a  life  which  had  felt  only  local  influences. 
Chief  among  those  influences  was  that  of  the 
lovely  scenery  by  which  the  poet's  young  imagina- 
tion was  enfolded.  Whether  he  was  one  of  the 
throng  which  waited  for  the  Queen  on  some  old-time 
highway,  or  stood  with  the  eager  crowd  who  gath- 
ered about  the  Castle  gates  on  the  great  day  of  the 
royal  visit,  is  of  no  consequence:  it  can  hardly  be 
doubted  that  the  imaginative  boy  of  eleven  did  not 
lose  that  splendid  spectacle  ;  what  is  certain  is  his 
familiarity  with  the  Warwickshire  landscape  —  that 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


fortunate  landscape  beautiful  in  itself  and  appeal- 
ing to  every  imagination  because  it  was  Shake- 
speare's country. 

There  are  more  striking  outlooks  than  those 
which  are  found  between  Kenilworth  and  Strat- 
ford ;  there  are 
more  fertile 
and  garden- 
like  stretches 
of  country; 
but  there  is 
nowhere  in 
England  hap- 
pier harmony 
of  the  typical 
qualities  of  the 
English  coun- 
try: gentle 
undulation  of 
wold  and 
wood,  groups 
of  ancient 
trees,  long 
lines  of  hedges, 
slow  rivers  winding  under  overhanging  branches 
and  loitering  in  places  of  immemorial  shade  ;  stately 
homes  rich  in  association  with  men  and  women 
of  force  or  craft,  or  possessed  of  the  noble  art  of 
gentleness  in  ungentle  times ;  a  low,  soft  sky  from 
which  clouds  are  rarely 'absent,  and  an  atmosphere 


MERVYN'S  TOWER. 

In  which  Amy  Robsart  was  imprisoned. 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  59 

which  softens  all  outlines,  subdues  all  sounds,  and 
works  magical  effects  of  light  and  distance.  These 
qualities  of  ripeness  and  repose  are  seen  in  their 
perfection  from  the  ruined  Mervyn's  Tower,  in 
which  Amy  Robsart  was  imprisoned.  As  far  as 
the  eye  can  reach,  the  landscape  is  full  of  a  tender 
and  gracious  beauty.  Nothing  arrests  ancl  holds  the 
attention,  for  the  loveliness  is  diffused  rather  than 
concentrated ;  it  lies  like  a  magical  veil  over  the 
whole  landscape,  concealing  nothing  and  yet  touch- 
ing everything  with  a  modulating  softness  which 
seems  almost  like  a  gift  from  the  imagination.  In 
midsummer,  when  the  grain  stands  almost  as  high 
as  a  man's  head,  the  foot-path  which  runs  through 
it  can  be  followed  for  a  long  distance  by  the  eye, 
so  sharply  cut  through  the  waving  fields  is  it. 
Those  winding  foot-paths,  which  take  one  away 
from  the  highroads  into  the  heart  of  the  country, 
are  nowhere  more  alluring  to  the  eye  and  the  im- 
agination than  in  Warwickshire.  They  make 
chances  for  intimacy  with  the  landscape  which  the 
highways  cannot  offer.  The  long-travelled  roads 
are  old  and  ripe  with  that  quiet  richness  of  setting 
which  comes  with  age ;  they  rise  and  fall  with  the 
gentle  movement  of  the  country;  they  are  often 
arched  with  venerable  trees ;  they  wind  up  hill  and 
down  in  leisurely,  picturesque  curves  and  lines ; 
they  cross  slow-moving  streams ;  they  often  loiter 
in  recesses  of  shade  which  centuries  have  conspired 
to  deepen  and  widen. 


6o 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


But  it  is  along  the  quiet  by-paths  that  one  comes 
upon  all  that  is  essential  and  characteristic  in  War- 
wickshire. These  immemorial  ways  put  any  man 
who  chooses  to  follow  them  in  possession  of  the 
landscape ;  they  cross  the  most  carefully  tended 
fields,  they  penetrate  the  most  jealously  guarded 
estates,  they  offer  access  to  ancient  places  of 

silence  and  se- 
clusion. The 
narrow  path 
between  the 
hedges  is  one 
of  those  rights 
of  the  English 
people  which 
evidence  their 
sover e  i  g  n  ty 
over  posses- 
sions the  titles 
to  which  have 
been  lodged  for 
centuries  in  pri- 
vate hands.  They  silently  affirm  that,  though  the 
acres  may  be  private  property,  the  landscape  is  the 
inalienable  possession  of  the  English  people.  In 
May,  when  the  hawthorn  is  in  bloom  and  the  night- 
ingale is  in  full  song,  a  Warwickshire  foot-path  leads 
one  into  a  world  as  ideal  as  the  island  in  "  The 
Tempest  "  or  the  fairy-haunted  country  of  the  "  Mid- 
summer Night's  Dream."  That  Shakespeare  knew 


THE   EARL   OF   LEICESTER,    1588. 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  6 1 

these  pathways  into  the  realm  of  the  imagination 
there  is  ample  evidence ;  that  he  was  familiar  with 
these  byways  about  Stratford  is  beyond  a  doubt. 
Does  not  one  of  them  still  lead  to  Shottery? 

Kenilworth,  which  was  a  noble  and  impressive 
stronghold  in  Shakespeare's  boyhood,  ample  enough 
to  entertain  a. court  with  long-continued,  and  mag- 
nificent pageants,  is  not  less  imposing  in  its  vast 
ruins  than  in  the  day  when  knights  rode  at  one 
another,  spears  at  rest,  in  the  tilting-yard  and  the 
Queen  was  received  at  the  great  gate  by  Leicester. 
In  the  loveliness  of  its  surroundings,  the  beauty  of 
its  outlook,  the  romantic  interest  of  its  ivy-covered 
ruins,  and  the  splendour  and  tragedy  of  its  historic 
fortunes,  it  symbolizes  the  harmony  of  natural  and 
human  association  which  invests  all  Warwickshire 
with  perennial  charm.  Much  of  this  charm  has 
come  since  Shakespeare's  time,  but  it  was  there  in 
quality  and  characteristic  when  he  roamed  afield 
on  summer  afternoons,  or,  on  holidays,  made  his 
way  to  Kenilworth,  Warwick,  or  Coventry.  It 
was  in  key  with  his  own  poised  and  harmonious 
spirit;  its  quality  is  diffused  through  his  work. 
For  nature  in  the  plays  is  always  subordinate  to 
the  unfolding  of  character  through  action,  but  is  so 
clearly  limned,  so  constantly  in  view,  so  much  and 
so  significantly  a  part  of  the  complete  impression 
which  conveys  not  only  a  drama  but  its  setting  and 
atmosphere,  that  it  must  have  had  large  space  in 
the  poet's  spiritual  life. 


62  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

There  are  touches  of  Warwickshire  in  all  Shake- 
speare's work:  in  "The  Winter's  Tale"  the  flowers 
of  Warwickshire  are  woven  together  in  one  of  the 
most  exquisite  calendars  of  season  and  blossom  in 
the  whole  range  of  poetry ;  in  "  As  You  Like  It " 
the  depths  and  hollows  and  long  stretches  of  shade 
of  the  old  Forest  of  Arden  rise  before  the  imagina- 
tion ;  in  "  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream  "  there  are 
bits  of  landscape  which  are  now  in  fairyland,  but 
were  once  good  solid  Warwickshire  soil.  The  valley 
of  the  Tweed  and  the  mountains  about  the  Scotch 
lakes  form  a  natural  background  for  Scott's  poetry ; 
the  Ayrshire  landscape  rises  into  view  again  and 
again  in  the  verse  of  Burns ;  the  lake  district  of 
Cumberland,  with  its  mists  and  multitudinous  voices 
of  hidden  streams,  lies  behind  Wordsworth's  verse. 
In  like  manner,  Warwickshire  lies  always  in  the 
background  of  Shakespeare's  mind,  and  gives  form, 
quality,  and  colour  to  the  landscape  of  his  poetry. 
Unless  dramatic  necessity  imposes  catastrophic 
effects  upon  him,  as  in  "Lear"  and  "Macbeth," 
Shakespeare's  landscape  is  reposeful,  touched  with 
ripe  and  tender  beauty,  happily  balanced  between 
extremes  in  temperature,  happily  poised  between 
austerity  and  prodigality  in  beauty.  Its  loveliness 
has  more  solidity  and  substance  than  that  which  the 
New  England  poets  loved  so  well,  and  the  fragrance 
of  which,  as  delicate  as  that  of  the  arbutus,  they  have 
caught  and  preserved ;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  it 
has  not  the  voluptuous  note,  the  beguiling  and  pas- 


THE   PATH    FROM   THE   FOREST   OF   ARDEN   TO    STRATFORD. 

A  typical  English  foot-path  through  the  meadows,  with  hedges  of  hawthorn  on  either 
side.  These  paths  are  sometimes  reached  by  a  stile,  as  in  this  case,  and  sometimes 
by  a  kissing-gate. 


64  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

sionate  sensuousness,  of  the  Italian  landscape.  The 
beauty  of  the  country  in  which  Rosalind  wanders 
and  Jacques  meditates  is  more  harmonious  with 
man's  spiritual  fortunes  and  less  sympathetic  with 
his  passion  than  that  in  which  Romeo  and  Juliet 
live  out  the  brief  and  ardent  drama  of  that  young 
love  which  sees  nothing  in  the  world  save  the 
reflection  of  itself.  The  landscape  of  the  Forest  of 
Arden  knows  all  the  changes  of  the  season,  and 
bends  the  most  obsequious  courtier  to  its  condi- 
tions; it  has  a  quiet  and  pervasive  charm  for  the 
senses,  but  its  deepest  appeal  is  to  the  imagination; 
there  is  in  it  a  noble  reticence  and  restraint  which 
exact  much  before  it  surrenders  its  ultimate  loveli- 
ness, and  in  its  surrender  it  reinvigorates  instead  of 
relaxing  and  debilitating.  Its  beauty  is  as  much  a 
matter  of  structure  as  of  form ;  as  much  a  matter 
of  atmosphere  as  of  colour.  And  this  is  the 
charm  of  Warwickshire. 

It  does  not  know  the  roll  and  thunder  of  the  sea, 
which  Tennyson  thought  were  more  tumultuous  and 
resonant  on  the  coast  of  Lincolnshire  than  any- 
where else  in  England ;  it  is  not  overlaid  with  the 
bloom  which  makes  Kent  a  garden  when  the  hop- 
vines  are  in  flower ;  it  lacks  that  something,  half 
legendary  and  half  real,  which  draws  to  Cornwall  so 
many  lovers  of  the  idylls  of  Arthur;  the  noble  large- 
ness of  the  Somerset  landscapes  is  not  to  be  found 
within  its  boundaries;  but  its  harmonious,  balanced, 
and  ripe  loveliness  is  its  own  and  is  not  to  be  found 
elsewhere. 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  65 

There  are  many  points  at  which  one  feels  this 
characteristic  charm.  From  Kenil worth  to  Strat- 
ford, if  one  goes  by  the  way  of  Warwick  and  Charle- 
cote,  it  is  continuous.  There  are  sweet  and  homely 
places  along  the  road  where  the  houses  seem  to 
belong  to  the  landscape  and  the  roses  climb  as  if 
they  longed  for  human  intercourse ;  j:here  are 


THE    FOREST   OF   ARDEN. 

The  remains  of  a  large  tract  of  forest  which  formerly  stretched  away  from  Stratford 
on  the  west  and  north. 

stretches  of  sward  so  green  and  deep  that  one  is 
sure  Shakespeare's  feet  might  have  pressed  them; 
there  are  trees  of  such  girth  and  circumference  of 
shade  that  Queen  Elizabeth  might  have  waited 
under  them  ;  there  are  vines  and  mosses  and  roses 
everywhere ;  and  everywhere  also  there  are  bits  of 
history  clinging  like  old  growths  to  fallen  walls,  and 
densely  shaded  hill,  and  stately  mansion  set  far  back 


66  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

in  noble  expanse  of  park.  Through  the  trees  the 
low  square  tower  guides  one  to  an  ancient  church 
set  among  ancient  graves,  with  a  sweet  solemnity 
enfolding  it  in  silence  and  peace.  The  fields  are 
richly  strewn  with  wild  flowers,  and  every  cliff, 
stone,  and  bit  of  ruined  wall  is  hung  deep  with  vine 
and  moss,  as  if  nature  could  not  care  enough  for 
beauty  in  a  country  in  which  men  care  so  much  for 
nature. 

Warwick  is  a  busy  town  on  court  and  market 
days,  but  the  old-world  charm  is  still  in  its  streets. 
Its  ancient  and  massive  gates  prepare  one  for  its 
quaint  and  narrow  streets,  on  which  half-timbered 
houses  still  stand;  the  venerable  and  picturesque 
Leicester  hospital,  founded  by  Lord  Dudley  in 
1571,  rising  above  the  narrow  entrance  to  the  town, 
as  one  approaches  it  from  Stratford,  like  a  custodian 
of  the  old-time  ways  and  men.  The  stream  of 
sightseers  which  pours  through  the  Castle  cannot 
lessen  its  impressiveness,  nor  dull  the  splendour  of 
the  ancient  baronial  life  which  invests  it  with  peren- 
nial interest.  The  view  from  the  plant  house,  with 
the  lovely  stretch  of  sward  to  the  Avon,  the  old-fash- 
ioned garden  on  the  left,  the  Castle  rising  in  mas- 
sive lines,  the  terraces  bright  with  flowers,  the 
cedars  of  Lebanon  dark  in  the  foreground,  is  one  of 
the  loveliest  in  England  for  its  setting  of  opulent 
and  dignified  English  life. 

But  the  view  which  Shakespeare  must  have  loved 
is  that  from  the  Avon  below  the  ruined  bridge, 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  67 

whose  piers,  crowned  with  foliage,  rise  out  of  the 
quiet  water  in  monumental  massiveness.  It  was  a 
fortunate  hour  which  relieved  them  from  the  every- 
day work  of  a  highway  for  traffic  and  made  them 
tributary  to  its  romantic  interest  and  beauty.  The 
dark  tower  rising  from  the  river's  brink,  the  long, 
massive  front  set  with  a  multitude  of  shining  win- 
dows, the  gardener's  cottage  blossoming  with  roses 
to  the  very  apex  of  the  roof,  the  quiet  river  in 


CHARLECOTE  HOUSE,  FROM  THE  AVON. 

which,  on  soft  afternoons,  all  this  beauty  and  gran- 
deur seem  to  sink  into  the  heart  of  nature  —  this  is 
Warwickshire  ;  where  nature,  legend,  and  history 
commingle  in  full  and  immemorial  stream  to  nour- 
ish and  enrich  an  ancient  and  beautiful  landscape. 

Warwick  Castle  is  a  type  of  the  great  baronial 
home;  Charlecote  belongs  to  another  and  more 
gracious  order  pf  architecture.  It  is  a  stately 


68  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

house,  with  the  characteristic  environment  of  a 
great  English  estate  —  the  long  reaches  of  park-like 
country,  the  fine  approaches,  the  herd  of  mottled 
deer  feeding  at  a  distance  with  that  intent  alertness 
which  shows  that  these  shy  creatures  are  at  home 
only  in  the  deep  woods.  No  lover  of  Shakespeare 
can  look  at  Charlecote  or  think  of  it  without  a  vision 
of  these  wild  creatures  grazing  at  high  noon  under 
the  shade  of  wide-spreading  oaks,  or  stealing  like 
phantoms  through  the  soft  moonlight.  Such  a  one 
has  no  curiosity  about  the  present  ownership  or 
occupancy  of  the  house  ;  there  lived,  nearly  three 
centuries  ago,  and  there  will  always  live,  the  immor- 
tal Justice  Shallow.  The  great  gates  open  upon 
one  of  the  loveliest  roads  ;  opposite  is  the  tumble- 
down stile,  a  curiosity  in  itself,  but  concerning 
whose  Shakespearean  associations  one  must  not 
inquire  too  closely.  The  house  dates  back  to  the 
year  1558,  and  the  noble  oaks,  chestnuts,- limes,  and 
elms  which  stand  in  great  groups  or  in  isolated 
beauty  in  the  park  must  have  a  still  older  date.  In 
its  long,  rambling  structure  the  architecture  of  Eliz- 
abeth's time  is  preserved  in  spite  of  later  changes. 
It  must  be  seen  from  the  Avon  if  its  spacious  struc- 
ture and  rich  setting  are  to  be  discerned  ;  from  the 
highway  it  is  stately  and  dignified,  but  it  is  not 
beautiful.  As  one  approaches  it  on  the  quiet  river 
it  discloses  itself  as  part  of  the  landscape.  Octago- 
nal towers,  turrets,  oriel  window  and  belfry;  the 
mellow  red  of  long-standing  walls  relieved  by  great 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  69 

masses  of  green ;  the  walled  terrace  with  great  urns 
which  in  the  blossoming  season  are  overflowing  foun- 
tains of  colour ;  the  quiet  loveliness  of  the  terraced 
ground  from  the  river  to  the  house  ;  the  broad  steps 
which  make  the  Avon  companionable  and  approach- 
able ;  the  dignity,  seclusion,  and  stately  beauty  of 
the  landscape  of  which  the  house  seems  the  focal 
point  —  all  these  separable  features  sink  into  the 
mind  and  leave  a  single  rich,  harmonious  impres- 
sion of  noble  and  characteristic  English  life.  A 
herd  of  deer  feeding  under  the  trees  looks  up  star- 
tled and  seems  to  melt  into  the  deeper  wood  :  the 
river  has  the  placidity  of  a  stream  which  has  never 
been  awakened  by  the  clamour  of  trade,  although 
it  turns  a  wheel  here  and  there  in  its  winding 
course ;  the  note  of  a  hidden  waterfall  penetrates 
the  silence  and  deepens  it. 

The  Avon  knows  no  gentler  landscape  than  that 
through  which  it  passes  as  it  glides  out  of  the 
shadow  of  Hampton  Lucy  bridge,  an  old  mill  close 
at  hand  and  a  waterfall  not  far  distant.  On  a  sum- 
mer day,  when  the  grain  is  ripening  in  the  fields,  it 
would  not  be  easy  to  find  a  more  charming  epitome 
of  rural  England:  the  gray  church  tower  rising 
above  a  noble  group  of  elms ;  the  little  village 
gathered  about  it  as  if  for  safety  and  companion- 
ship ;  the  murmur  of  the  river  as  it  drops  into  a 
lower  channel ;  the  wide  sunlighted  fields,  with 
glimpses  of  scarlet  through  the  green  and  gold,  and 
the  larks  rising  out  of  their  hidden  nests,  mounting 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


swiftly  until  they  become  mere  points  against  the 
soft  blue  of  the  low  sky  or  the  white  masses  of 
drifting  cloud,  hanging  poised  in  mid-air  and  pour- 
ing out  a  flood  of  sweet, 
clear,  haunting  notes, 
full  of  the  sound  of  run- 
ning water,  of  deep 
woods  where  the  sun 
sets  them  aflame,  and  of 
the  great  open  spaces 
of  the  meadows.  No 
other  bird  has  a  note 


THE    ROAD   TO    HAMPTON    LUCY. 


so  jubilant  with  the  unspent  freshness  of  nature;  a 
sound  in  which  there  is  no  pathos  of  human  need 
or  sorrow,  but  the  overflowing  joyousness  of  that 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  71 

world  in  which  the  deep  springs  are  fed  and  the 
roots  of  flowers  nourished. 

Hark  !  hark  !  the  lark  at  heaven's  gate  sings, 

And  Phoebus  'gins  arise, 
His  steeds  to  water  at  those  springs 

On  chaliced  flowers  that  lies ; 
And  winking  Mary- buds  begin 

To  ope  their  golden  eyes. 

The  lark's  note  of  unforced  joyousness  is  often 
heard  in  Shakespeare's  plays  ;  its  buoyant  music, 
rising  as  if  from  inexhaustible  springs,  was  akin  to 
his  own  fresh  and  effortless  melody. 

Between  Hampton  Lucy  and  Stratford  the  dis- 
tance is  not  great,  but  the  river  moves  with  a  lei- 
surely indifference  to  time  which  is  amply  justified 
by  the  beauty  of  its  course.  When  that  course  lies 
enfolded  in  green  and  shaded  loveliness,  it  is  doubt- 
ful whether  any  point  has  a  more  compelling  charm 
than  the  quiet  graveyard  where  Holy  Trinity  keeps 
watch  and  ward,  over  its  ancient  dead.  On  a 
moonlit  night  there  is  enchantment  in  the  place ; 
the  moment  one  leaves  the  street  and  enters  the 
arching  avenue  of  limes,  the  England  of  to-day 
becomes  the  England  of  long  ago.  The  spire  of 
the  church,  rising  above  the  trees,  seeming  to  bring 
into  more  striking  relief  the  long,  narrow,  dark 
nave ;  the  graves,  grass-grown  and  so  much  a  part 
of  the  place  that  they  suggest  the  common  mortal- 
ity of  the  race  rather  than  solitary  death  or  individ- 
ual loss ;  the  level  common  across  the  river,  which 


72  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

nightingales  love  when  the  bloom  of  May  is  on  the 
hedges  ;  the  deep  shadows  in  which  the  river  loses 
itself  as  one  looks  toward  the  mill,  and  the  dark 
outlines  and  twinkling  lights  as  one  turns  toward 
the  village :  all  these  aspects  of  the  place,  under  the 
spell  of  one  great  memory,  touch  the  imagination 
and  make  it  aware  of  a  brooding  presence  which, 
although  withdrawn  from  sight,  still  loves  and 
haunts  this  place  of  quiet  meditation  and  of  a 
beauty  in  which  joy  and  pathos  are  deeply  harmo- 
nized. Apart  from  the  sentiment  which  the  place 
of  Shakespeare's  burial  must  inevitably  evoke,  there 
is  that  in  the  scene  itself  which  interprets  Shake- 
speare's spirit  and  makes  his  genius  more  near  and 
companionable. 

On  such  a  night  one  turns  instinctively  toward 
Shottery  with  the  feeling  that  the  poet  must  have 
taken  the  same  course  on  many  another  night  as 
silent  and  fragrant.  The  old  foot-path  is  readily 
found,  and  the  meadows  on  either  side  are  sleeping 
as  gently  in  the  soft,  diffused  light  of  the  mid-sum- 
mer night  as  when  the  poet  saw  them  in  his  youth. 
The  little  hamlet,  a  mile  to  the  eastward,  is  soon 
reached,  and  the  cottage  in  which  Anne  Hathaway 
spent  her  girlhood  is  so  well  impressed  on  the 
memory  of  the  English-reading  world  that  it  is 
recognizable  at  a  glance.  The  elms  rise  over  it  as 
if  to  protect  it  from  the  harsh  approaches  of  wind 
and  storm;  it  is  so  embosomed  in  vines  that  it 
seems  to  be  part  of  the  old-time  garden  whose 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  73 

flowers  bloom  to  the  very  stepping-stones  of  en- 
trance. Its  thatched  roof,  timbered  walls,  and  pro- 
jecting eaves  have  preserved  its  ancient  aspect ;  and 
the  story  of  its  age  is  told  still  more  distinctly  in 
its  low  and  blackened  ceilings,  its  stone  floors,  its 
broad  hearth  and  capacious  chimney-seats. 


THE  "BANK  WHERE  THE  WILD  THYME  BLOWS." 

This  bank  is  not  far  from  Shottery,  and  is  the  only  place  near  Stratford  where  the 
wild  thyme  is  found. 

To  the  west  and  north  of  Stratford  the  Forest 
of  Arden  once  covered  a  great  stretch  of  territory, 
and  traces  of  its  noble  beauty  are  still  to  be  dis- 
cerned in  the  trees  which  spread  a  deep  shade 
over  hollow  and  hillside  as  one  rambles  across  the 
Welcombe  hills.  In  the  distance  the  clustered 


74  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

chimneys  of  Charlecote  are  seen,  and  the  ridge 
where  the  battle  of  Edge  Hill  was  fought.  The 
Forest  of  Arden  has  been  a  place  of  refuge  for 
the  imagination  ever  since  the  time  when,  by  the 
alembic  of  Shakespeare's  genius,  it  was  transferred 
from  Warwickshire  to  that  world  in  which  time 
does  not  run  nor  age  wither;  enough  remains  of 
ancient  tree  and  shadowy  silence  to  make  its  noble 
beauty  credible.  The  foot-path  brings  one  past  the 
gates  of  Clopton  —  a  spacious  and  dignified  house, 
with  a  charming  outlook,  fine  old  gardens,  some 
very  interesting  pictures,  a  rich  heritage  of  ghost 
stories,  and  a  generous  host.  The  stone  effigies 
of  the  Cloptons  now  fill  the  ancient  pew  in  Holy 
Trinity,  but  they  were  long  the  foremost  family 
at  Stratford,  men  of  force  and  benefactors  of  the 
town.  Sir  Hugh  Clopton,  who  built  the  bridge 
over  the  Avon,  and  rebuilt  the  Guild  Chapel,  be- 
came Lord  Mayor  of  London ;  and  others  who 
bore  the  name  honoured  it.  In  the  tower  of  the 
Guild  Chapel  there  is  a  quaint  recital  of  the  vir- 
tues and  generosity  of  Sir  Hugh:  "This  monu- 
mental table  was  erected  A.D.  1708,  at  the  request 
of  the  Corporation  (by  Sir  John  Clopton,  of  Clop- 
ton, Knt.,  their  Recorder),  in  memory  of  Sir  Hugh 
Clopton,  Knt.  (a  younger  branch  of  yt  ancient 
family),  whose  pious  works  were  so  many  and 
great,  they  ought  to  be  had  in  everlasting  remem- 
brance, especially  by  this  town  and  parish,  to  which 
he  was  a  particular  benefactor,  where  he  gave  ,£100 


SHAKESPEARE'S   COUNTRY  75 

to  poor  housekeepers  and  100  marks  to  twenty 
poor  maidens  of  good  name  and  fame,  to  be  paid 
at  their  marriages.  He  built  ye  stone  bridge  over 
Avon,  with  ye  causey  at  ye  west  end ;  farther  mani- 
festing his  piety  to  God,  and  love  to  this  place  of 
his  nativity,  as  ye  centurion  in  ye  Gospel  did  to 
ye  Jewish  Nation  and  Religion,  by  building  them 
a  Synagogue ;  for  at  his  sole  charge,  this  beautiful 
Chappel  of  ye  Holy  Trinity  was  rebuilt,  temp  H. 
VII,  and  ye  Cross  He  of  ye  parish  Church.  He 
gave  ^"50  to  ye  repairing  bridges  and  highways 
within  10  miles  of  this  town."  Then  follows  a 
recital  of  a  number  of  benefactions  to  London 
and  other  parts  of  the  country,  closing  with  the 
words:  "This  charatable  Gent  died  a  Bachelr  15 
Sept.  1496,  and  was  buried  in  Saint  Margaret's 
Church,  Lothbury,  London." 

In  this  country  Shakespeare's  young  imagination 
was  unfolded ;  against  this  background  of  tender 
and  pervasive  beauty  he  came  to  consciousness, 
not  perhaps,  of  the  quality  and  range  of  his  genius, 
but  of  the  nobility  of  form  and  loveliness  of  colour 
against  which  the  comedy  and  tragedy  of  human 
life  are  set  as  upon  a  divinely  ordered  stage. 


CHAPTER    IV 

MARRIAGE   AND   LONDON 

THERE  are  traditions  but  no  records  of  the 
period  between  1577,  when  Shakespeare's  school 
life  ended,  and  the  year  1586,  when  he  left  Strat- 
ford. In  this  age,  when  all  events,  significant  and 
insignificant,  are  reported ;  when  biography  has 
assumed  proportions  which  are  often  out  of  all 
relation  to  the  importance  or  interest  of  those 
whose  careers  are  described  with  microscopic  de- 
tail ;  when  men  of  letters,  especially,  are  urged  to 
produce  and  publish  with  the  greatest  rapidity, 
are  photographed,  studied,  described,  and  charac- 
terized with  journalistic  energy  and  industry,  and 
often  with  journalistic  indifference  to  perspective ; 
and  when  every  paragraph  from  the  pen  of  a  suc- 
cessful writer  is  guarded  from  the  purloiner  and 
protected  from  plagiarist  by  laws  and  penalties, 
it  seems  incredible  that  so  little,  relatively,  should 
be  known  about  the  daily  life,  the  working  rela- 
tions, the  intimate  associations,  the  habits  and 
artistic  training,  of  the  greatest  of  English  poets. 

And  this  absence  of  biographic  material  on  a 
scale  which  would  seem  adequate  from  the  modern 
point  of  view  has  furnished,  not  the  ground  —  for 

76 


MARRIAGE  AND   LONDON  77 

the  word  ground  implies  a  certain  solidity  or  basis 
of  fact  —  but  the  occasion,  of  many  curious  specu- 
lations and  of  some  radical  scepticism.  Absence 
of  the  historical  sense  has  often  led  the  rash  and 
uncritical  to  read  into  past  times  the  spirit  and 
thought  of  the  present,  and  to  interpret  the  con- 
ditions of  an  earlier  age  in  the  light  of  existing 
conditions.  Taking  into  account  the  habits  of 
Shakespeare's  time ;  the  condition  of  life  into 
which  he  was  born ;  the  fact  that  he  was  not 
a  writer  of  dramas  to  be  read,  but  of  plays  to  be 
acted,  and  that,  in  his  own  thought  and  in  the 
thought  of  his  contemporaries,  he  was  a  playwright 
who  lived  by  writing  for  the  stage  and  not  a 
poet  who  appealed  to  a  reading  public  and  was 
eager  for  literary  reputation ;  recalling  the  inferior 
position  which  actors  occupied  in  society,  and  the 
bohemian  atmosphere  in  which  all  men  who  were 
connected  with  the  stage  lived,  it  is  surprising, 
not  that  we  know  so  little,  but  that  we  know  so 
much,  about  Shakespeare. 

Mr.  Halliwell-Phillipps  has  covered  this  ground 
with  admirable  clearness  and  precision :  "  In  this 
aspect  the  great  dramatist  participates  in  the  fate 
of  most  of  his  literary  contemporaries,  for  if  a  col- 
lection of  the  known  facts  relating  to  all  of  them 
were  tabularly  arranged,  it  would  be  found  that 
the  number  of  the  ascertained  particulars  of  his 
life  reached  at  least  the  average.  At  the  present 
day,  with  biography  carried  to  a  wasteful  and 


78  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

ridiculous  excess,  and  Shakespeare  the  idol  not 
merely  of  a  nation  but  of  the  educated  world,  it 
is  difficult  to  realize  a  period  when  no  interest 
was  taken  in  the  events  in  the  lives  of  authors, 
and  when  the  great  poet  himself,  notwithstanding 
the  immense  popularity  of  some  of  his  works,  was 
held  in  no  general  reverence.  It  must  be  borne 
in  mind  that  actors  then  occupied  an  inferior  posi- 
tion in  society,  and  that  in  many  quarters  even 
the  vocation  of  a  dramatic  writer  was  considered 
scarcely  respectable.  The  intelligent  appreciation 
of  genius  by  individuals  was  not  sufficient  to  neu- 
tralize in  these  matters  the  effect  of  public  opinion 
and  the  animosity  of  the  religious  world,  —  all  cir- 
cumstances thus  uniting  to  banish  general  interest 
in  the  history  of  persons  connected  in  any  way 
with  the  stage.  This  biographical  indifference 
continued  for  many  years,  and  long  before  the 
season  arrived  for  a  real  curiosity  to  be  taken  in 
the  subject,  the  records  from  which  alone  a  satis- 
factory memoir  could  have  been  constructed  had 
disappeared.  At  the  time  of  Shakespeare's  decease, 
non-political  correspondence  was  rarely  preserved, 
elaborate  diaries  were  not  the  fashion,  and  no  one, 
excepting  in  semi-apocryphal  collections  of  jests, 
thought  it  worth  while  to  record  many  of  the  say- 
ings and  doings,  or  to  delineate  at  any  length  the 
characters,  of  actors  and  dramatists,  so  that  it  is 
generally  by  the  merest  accident  that  particulars 
of  interest  respecting  them  have  been  recovered." 


MARRIAGE   AND    LONDON  79 

History,  tradition,  contemporary  judgments  scat- 
tered through  a  wide  range  of  books  and  succeeded 
by  a  "  Centime  of  Prayse,"  the  fruits  of  the  critical 
scholarship  of  the  last  half-century,  the  Record  in 
the  Stationers'  Register  taken  in  connection  with 
the  dates  of  the  first  representations  of  the  different 
plays ;  and,  finally,  the  study  of  Shakespeare's  work 
as  a  whole,  have,  however,  gone  a  long  way  toward 


THE   PATH   TO   SHOTTERY. 
Kissing-gate  in  foreground. 


making  good  the  absence  of  voluminous  biographic 
material.  Enough  remains  to  make  the  story  of 
the  poet's  career  connected  and  intelligible,  the 
record  of  his  growth  as  an  artist  clear  and  deeply 
significant,  and  the  history  of  his  spiritual  develop- 
ment legible  and  of  absorbing  interest. 

The   kind   of    occupation   which   fell    to   Shake- 
speare's hands  during  the  five  years  of  his  adoles- 


80  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

cence  between  1577  and  1582  is  a  matter  of  minor 
interest;  the  education  of  sense  and  imagination 
which  he  received  during  that  impressionable 
period  is  a  matter  of  supreme  interest.  That  he 
early  formed  the  habit  of  exact  observation  his 
work  shows  in  places  innumerable.  No  detail  of 
natural  life  escaped  him ;  the  plays  are  not  only 
saturated  with  the  spirit  of  nature,  but  they  are 
accurate  calendars  of  natural  events  and  phenom- 
ena ;  they  abound  in  the  most  exact  descriptions 
of  those  details  of  landscape,  flora,  and  animal  life 
which  a  writer  must  learn  at  first  hand  and  which 
he  can  learn  only  when  the  eye  is  in  the  highest 
degree  sensitive  and  the  imagination  in  the  highest 
degree  responsive.  A  boy  of  Shakespeare's  genius 
and  situation  would  have  mastered  almost  uncon- 
sciously the  large  and  thorough  knowledge  of  trees, 
flowers,  birds,  dogs,  and  horses  which  his  work 
shows.  Such  a  boy  sees,  feels,  and  remembers 
everything  which  in  any  way  relates  itself  to  his 
growing  mind.  The  Warwickshire  landscape  be- 
came, by  the  unconscious  process  of  living  in  its 
heart,  a  part  of  his  memory,  the  background  of  his 
conscious  life.  He  knew  it  passively  in  number- 
less walks,  loiterings,  solitary  rambles ;  and  he 
knew  it  actively,  for  there  is  every  reason  to  believe 
that  he  participated  in  the  sports  of  his  time,  and 
saw  fields  and  woods  and  remote  bits  of  landscape 
as  one  sees  them  in  hunting,  coursing,  and  fishing. 
He  was  in  a  farming  country,  and  his  kin  on  both 


MARRIAGE   AND    LONDON 


81 


sides  were  landowners  or  farmers ;  he  had  oppor- 
tunities to  become  acquainted  not  only  with  the 
country,  but  with  the  habits  of  the  birds  and  ani- 
mals that  lived  in  it. 

He  loved  action  as  well  as  meditation,  and  his 
life  was  marvellously  well  poised  when  one  recalls 
what  perilous  stuff  of  thought,  passion,  and  imagi- 
nation were 
in  him.  It 
was  perhaps 
through  phys- 
ical activity 
that  he  worked 
off  the  fer- 
ment of  ado- 
lescence, and  r^ 
went  through 
the  storm-and- 
stress  period  without  serious  excess  or  mistake  of 
direction.  Sport  would  have  furnished  a  natural 
outlet  for  such  a  nature  as  his  at  a  time  when  self- 
expression  in  some  form  was  inevitable ;  and  the 
spirit  of  sport,  once  aroused  in  a  youth  of  ardent 
temperament*  was  not  careful  of  the  arbitrary  lines 
which  property  draws  across  the  landscape.  To 
the  sportsman  the  countryside  is  one  unbroken 
field. 

There  may  have  been,  therefore,  some  basis  of 
fact  for  the  tradition  which  has  long  affirmed  that 
an  unsuccessful  poaching  adventure  in  Gharlecote 


THE   BOAR   AT    CHARLECOTE   GATE. 


82  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Park  led  to  the  poet's  departure  from  Stratford. 
This  story  was  told  succinctly  by  Rowe  nearly 
a  century  after  Shakespeare's  death.  "  He  had, 
by  a  misfortune  common  enough  to  young  fellows, 
fallen  into  ill  company,  and,  among  them,  some, 
that  made  a  frequent  practice  of  deer-stealing, 
engaged  him  with  them  more  than  once  in  robbing 
a  park  that  belonged  to  Sir  Thomas  Lucy  of 
Charlecote,  near  Stratford.  For  this  he  was  prose- 
cuted by  that  gentleman,  as  he  thought,  somewhat 
too  severely;  and,  in  order  to  revenge  that  ill- 
usage,  he  made  a  ballad  upon  him,  and  though 
this,  probably  the  first  essay  of  his  poetry,  be  lost, 
yet  it  is  said  to  have  been  so  very  bitter  that  it 
redoubled  the  prosecution  against  him  to  that 
degree  that  he  was  obliged  to  leave  his  business 
and  family  in  Warwickshire  and  shelter  himself  in 
London." 

Facts  have  come  to  light  in  late  years  which 
seem  to  show  that  the  deer-park  at  Charlecote  was 
not  in  existence  until  a  much  later  date,  and  it  has 
been  assumed  by  some,  who  are  perhaps  over- 
anxious for  Shakespeare's  reputation,  that  the 
poaching  story  is  entirely  legendary.  It  rests 
entirely  on  tradition;  but  the  tradition  was  per- 
sistent during  many  decades,  and  finds  some  sup- 
port in  the  fact  that  Justice  Shallow  is  beyond 
doubt  a  humorous  study  of  the  Sir  Thomas  Lucy 
of  prosecuting  temper.  No  trace  of  the  ballad 
mentioned  by  Rowe  re-mains.  Poaching  of  this 


MARRIAGE   AND    LONDON  83 

kind,  although  punishable  by  imprisonment,  was 
not  regarded  at  that  time  as  a  very  serious  offence 
against  good  morals,  although  not  without  grave 
provocation  to  landowners.  Young  men  at  the 
universities  were  not  unfrequently  detected  in  the 
same  forbidden  but  fascinating  sport.  It  is  per- 
haps significant  that  Sir  Peter  Lucy,  about  this 


CHARLECOTE. 
As  it  appeared  in  the  year  1722. 


time,  publicly  advocated  the  passage  of  more  strin- 
gent game  laws. 

The  evidence  is  neither  direct  nor  conclusive, 
but,  taken  as  a  whole,  it  seems  to  confirm  the 
poaching  tradition.  It  was,  in  any  event,  a  much 
more  serious  matter  for  the  owner  of  Charlecote 
than  for  the  Stratford  youth  who  fell  into  his 
hands;  for  Justice  Shallow  has  been  accepted  by 
later  generations  as  a  portrait  rather  than  a  cari- 
cature; and  what  Shakespeare  left  undone  in  the 
way  of  satirizing  the  landowner  against  whom  he 


84 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


had  offended,  another  poet  of  Warwickshire  birth, 
Walter  Savage  Landor,  completed  in  his  brilliant 
"  Citation  and  Examination  of  William  Shake- 
speare." It  ought  not  to  be  forgotten,  however, 
that  the  victim  of  the  satirical  genius  of  Shake- 
speare and  Landor  wrote  these  touching  words  for 

the   tomb  of   his  wife    in 
Charlecote  church: 

"All  the  time  of  her 
Lyfe  a  true  and  faithfull 
servant  of  her  good  God ; 
never  detected  of  any 
crime  or  vice ;  in  religion 
most  sound;  in  love  to 
her  husband  most  faithfull 
and  true.  In  friendship 
most  constant.  To  what 
in  trust  was  committed 
to  her  most  secret;  in 
wisdom  excelling ;  in  gov- 
erning her  House  and 
bringing  up  of  Youth  in 

the  feare  of  God  that  did  converse  with  her  most  rare 
and  singular;  a  great  maintainer  of  hospitality; 
greatly  esteemed  of  her  betters;  misliked  of  none 
unless  the  envious.  When  all  is  spoken  that  can 
be  said,  a  Woman  so  furnished  and  garnished  with 
Virtue  as  not  to  be  bettered,  and  hardly  to  be 
equalled  of  any;  as  she  lived  most  virtuously,  so 
she  dyed  most  godly.  Set  down  by  him  that  best 


SIR  T.    LUCY. 


Monument  in  Charlecote  Church. 


MARRIAGE   AND   LONDON  85 

did  know  what  hath  been  written  to  be  true, 
Thomas  Lucy." 

Sir  Thomas  may  have  had  the  qualities  which 
Shakespeare  imputed  to  him,  but  the  likeness  of 
the  author  of  this  touching  inscription  can  have 
been  caught  only  by  the  license  of  caricature  in 
Justice  Shallow. 

The  poaching  episode,  if  it  has  any  historical 
basis,  probably  took  place  in  1585,  when  Shake- 
speare had  been  three  years  married,  and,  although 
barely  twenty-one  years  old,  was  the  father  of  three 
children.  Richard  Hathaway,  described  as  a  "  hus- 
bandman," was  the  owner  of  a  small  property  at 
Shottery,  a  mile  distant  from  Stratford,  and  reached 
not  only  by  the  highway  but  by  a  delightful  foot- 
path through  the  fields.  The  thatched  cottage,  so 
carefully  preserved  by  the  trustees  of  the  Shake- 
speare properties,  has  doubtless  suffered  many 
changes  since  1582,  but  remains  a  picturesque 
example  of  a  farmhouse  of  Shakespeare's  time.  It 
did  not  pass  out  of  the  hands  of  the  Hathaway 
family  until  about  the  middle  of  the  present  cen- 
tury, and  Mrs.  Baker,  the  custodian,  who  died  in 
1899,  was  a  Hathaway  by  descent.  Although 
Shottery  is  in  the  parish  of  Stratford,  no  record  of 
Shakespeare's  marriage  to  Anne,  the  daughter  of 
Richard  Hathaway,  has  been  found  in  the  parish 
register.  In  the  Edgar  Tower  at  Worcester,  how- 
ever, a  bit  of  parchment  in  the  form  of  a  marriage 
bond  furnishes  conclusive  contemporary  evidence. 


86  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

By  the  terms  of  this  bond,  signed  by  Fulk  Sandells 
and  John  Richardson,  husbandmen  of  Shottery 
it  is  affirmed  that  no  impediment  existed  to  the 
marriage  of  William  Shakespeare  and  Anne  Hatha- 
way. The  document  is  dated  November  28,  1582 
and  the  bondsmen  make  themselves  responsible  ir. 
the  sum  of  forty  pounds  in  case  any  impediment 


ANNE  HATHAWAY'S  COTTAGE. 

The  living-room:    Mrs.  Baker,  the  custodian,  who  died  in  1899,  a  member  of  the 
Hathaway  family,  by  the  fireplace. 

should  be  disclosed  subsequently.  The  bond 
stipulates  that  the  friends  of  the  bride  shall 
consent  to  her  marriage,  and,  in  that  event,  the 
customary  reading  of  banns  in  church  may  be 
dispensed  with  and  the  marriage  take  place  at 
once. 

In    any    one    of    the*  three   parishes   within    the 


MARRIAGE   AND   LONDON  87 

diocese  in  which  the  contracting  parties  lived 
the  marriage  might  have  taken  place.  The  regis- 
ters of  two  of  the  parishes  have  been  searched 
without  result ;  the  register  of  the  third  parish 
disappeared  at  the  time  of  the  fire  which  de- 
stroyed the  church  at  Luddington  in  which  it 
was  kept.  Marriage  bonds  were  not  uncommon 
in  Shakespeare's  time,  but  they  were  not  often 
entered  into  by  persons  in  Shakespeare's  posi- 
tion ;  the  process  was  more  expensive  and  com- 
plicated than  the  "  asking  of  the  banns,"  but  it 
offered  one  advantage :  it  shortened  the  time 
within  which  the  ceremony  might  take  place.  The 
bridegroom  in  this  case  was  a  minor  by  three 
years,  and  the  formal  assent  of  his  parents  ought 
to  have  been  secured ;  the  bond,  however,  stipulates 
only  that  the  friends  of  the  bride  shall  give  their 
consent. 

In  such  bonds  the  name  of  the  groom  or  of  his 
father  usually  appears ;  in  this  case  no  member 
of  Shakespeare's  family  is  named ;  the  two  bonds- 
men were  not  only  residents  of  Shottery,  but 
one  of  them  is  described  in  the  will  of  the  bride's 
father  as  "  my  trustie  friende  and  neighbour."  The 
circumstances  seem  to  suggest  that  the  marriage 
was  secured,  or  at  least  hastened,  by  the  family  of 
the  bride ;  and  this  surmise  finds  its  possible  con- 
firmation in  the  fact  that  the  marriage  took  place 
about  the  time  of  the  execution  of  the  bond  on 
November  28,  1582,  while  the  poet's  first  child,  his 


88  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

daughter  Susannah,  was  christened  in  Holy  Trinity, 
at  Stratford,  on  the  26th  day  of  May,  1583.  It  has 
been  suggested  on  high  authority  that  a  formal 
betrothal,  of  the  kind  which  had  the  moral  weight 
of  marriage,  had  taken  place.  The  absence  of  any 
reference  to  the  groom's  family  in  the  marriage 
bond  makes  this  doubtful.  These  are  the  facts  so 
far  as  they  have  been  discovered ;  it  ought  to  be 
remembered,  as  part  of  the  history  of  this  episode 
in  Shakespeare's  life,  that  he  was  a  boy  of  eighteen 
at  the  time  of  his  marriage,  and  that  Anne  Hatha- 
way was  eight  years  his  senior. 

That  he  was  an  ardent  and  eloquent  lover  it  is 
impossible  to  doubt;  the  tradition  that  he  was  an 
unhappy  husband  is  based  entirely  on  the  assump- 
tion that,  while  his  family  remained  in  Stratford, 
for  twelve  years  he  was  almost  continuously  absent 
in  London,  and  that  he  seems  to  speak  with  deep 
feeling  about  the  disastrous  effects  of  too  great 
intimacy  before  marriage,  and  of  the  importance  of 
a  woman's  marrying  a  man  older  than  herself : 

...  let  still  the  woman  take 
An  elder  than  herself ;  so  wears  she  to  him, 
So  sways  she  level  in  her  husband's  heart. 

This  is,  however,  pure  inference,  and  it  is  perilous 
to  draw  inferences  of  this  kind  from  phrases  which 
a  dramatist  puts  into  the  mouths  of  men  and 
women  who  are  interpreting,  not  their  author's  con- 
victions and  feelings,  but  a  phase  of  character,  a 
profound  human  experience,  or  the  play  of  thai 


MARRIAGE   AND   LONDON 


89 


irony  which  every  play- 
wright from  y^Eschylus  to 
Ibsen  has  felt  deeply. 
The  dramatist  reveals  his 
personality  as  distinctly 
as  does  the  lyric  poet,  but 
not  in  the  same  way. 
Shakespeare's  view  of  life, 
his  conception  of  human 
d  e  s  t  i  n  y,  his  attitude 
toward  society,  his  ideals 
of  character,  are  to  be 
found,  not  in  detached 
passages  framed  and  col- 
oured by  dramatic  neces- 
sities, but  in  the  large  and 
consistent  conception  of 
life  which  underlies  the 
entire  body  of  his  work; 
in  the  justice  and  sanity 
with  which  the  external 
deed  is  bound  to  the  in- 
ward impulse  and  the  visi- 
ble  penalty  developed  out 
of  the  invisible  sin ;  in  the 
breadth  of  outlook  upon 
human  experience,  the 
sanity  and  balance  of 
judgment,  the  clarity  and 
sweetness  of  temper  which 


A  VIEW  OF  WARWICK   IN 

SHAKESPEARE'S  TIME. 

From  an  old  print. 


90  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

kept  an  imagination  always  brooding  over  the  tragic 
possibilities  of  experience,  and  haunted  by  all  man- 
ner of  awful  shapes  of  sin,  misery,  and  madness, 
poised  in  health,  vigour,  and  radiant  serenity. 

It  is  perilous  to  draw  any  inference  as  to  the 
happiness  or  unhappiness  which  came  into  Shake- 
speare's life  with  his  rash  marriage.  It  is  true  that 
he  spent  many  years  in  London  ;  but  when  he  had 
been  there  only  eleven  years,  and  was  still  a  young 
man,  he  secured  a  home  for  himself  in  Stratford. 
He  became  a  resident  of  his  native  place  when  he 
was  still  in  middle  life  ;  there  is  evidence  that  his 
interest  in  Stratford  and  his  communication  with  it 
were  never  interrupted  ;  that  his  care  not  only  for  his 
family  but  for  his  father  was  watchful  and  efficient; 
there  is  no  reason  to  doubt  that,  taking  into  account 
the  difficulties  and  expense  of  travel,  his  visits  to 
his  home  were  frequent  ;  there  is  no  evidence  that 
his  family  was  not  with  him  at  times  in  London. 
In  this  aspect  of  his  life,  as  in  many  others,  absence 
of  detailed  and  trustworthy  information  furnishes 
no  ground  for  inferences  unfavourable  to  his  happi- 
ness or  his  integrity. 

The  immediate  occasion  of  Shakespeare's  leaving 
Stratford  is  a  matter  of  minor  importance ;  the 
poaching  episode  may  have  hastened  it,  but  could 
hardly  have  determined  a  career  so  full  of  the 
power  of  self-direction.  Sooner  or  later  he  must 
have  gone  to  London,  for  London  was  the  one 
place  in  England  which4 could  afford  him  the  oppor- 


Copyright,  1899,  by  A.  W.  Elson  &  Co.,  Boston 

IN  THE  GARDEN   OF  ANNE   HATHAWAY'S   COTTAGE. 

The  figure  in  the  foreground  is  the  late  custodian,  Mrs.  Baker. 


MARRIAGE   AND   LONDON  91 

tunity  which  his  genius  demanded.  It  cannot 
be  doubted  that  through  all  the  ferment  and  spirit- 
ual unrest  through  which  such  a  spirit  as  his  must 
have  gone  —  that  searching  and  illuminating  experi- 
ence which  is  appointed  to  every  great  creative 
nature  —  his  mind  had  moved  uncertainly  but 
inevitably  toward  the  theatre  as  the  sphere  for  the 
expression  of  the  rich  and  passionate  life  steadily 
deepening  and  rising  within  him.  The  atmosphere 
and  temper  of  his  time,  the  growing  spirit  of  nation- 
ality, the  stories  upon  which  his  imagination  had 
been  fed  from  earliest  childhood,  the  men  whom  he 
knew,  the  instinct  and  impulse  of  his  own  nature  — 
these  things  determined  his  career,  and,  far  more 
insistently  than  any  outward  circumstance  or  hap- 
pening, drew  him  to  London. 

His  daughter  Susannah  was  born  in  May,  1583; 
in  February,  1585,  his  twin  children,  Hamnet  and 
Judith,  were  baptized.  He  had  assumed  the  grav- 
est responsibilities,  and  there  is  no  reason  to  doubt 
that  he  felt  their  full  weight.  Stratford  offered  him 
nothing  which  would  have  been  anything  more  than 
drudgery  to  such  a  nature  as  his.  To  London,  there- 
fore, in  1586  he  made  his  way  in  search  of  work  and 
opportunity. 

There  were  two  well-established  routes  to  Lon- 
don in  that  day  of  few,  bad,  and  dangerous  roads  ; 
one  ran  through  Banbury  and  Aylesbury,  and  the 
other,  which  lay  a  little  farther  to  the  west  and  was 
a  little  longer,  ran  through  Oxford  and  High 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


Wycombe.  The  journey  was  made  in  the  saddle  or 
on  foot;  there  were  no  other  methods  of  travel. 
Goods  of  all  kinds  were  carried  by  packhorses; 


L 


THE   CROWN    INN,    OXFORD. 


Where,  according  to  tradition,  Shakespeare  lodged  on  his  way  to  London, 
print.      This  inn  has  entirely  disappeared. 


From  an  old 


wagons  were  very  rude  and  very  rare ;  it  was  fifty 
years  later  before  vehicles  began  to  run  regularly 
as  public  conveyances.  *  If  Shakespeare,  after  the 


MARRIAGE  AND   LONDON  93 

custom  of  the  time,  bought  a  horse  for  the  occasion, 
he  probably  sold  it,  as  Mr.  Halliwell-Phillipps  sug- 
gests, on  reaching  Smithfield,  to  James  Burbage, 
who  was  a  livery-man  in  that  neighbourhood  —  the 
father  of  the  famous  actor  Richard  Burbage,  with 
whom  the  poet  was  afterwards  thrown  in  intimate 
relations.  It  was  the  custom  among  men  of  small 
means  to  buy  horses  for  a  journey,  and  sell  them 
when  the  journey  was  accomplished.  Tradition 
has  long  affirmed  that  Shakespeare  habitually  used 
the  route  which  ran  through  Oxford  and  High 
Wycombe.  The  Crown  Inn,  which  stood  near 
Carfax,  in  Oxford,  was  the  centre  of  many  associa- 
tions, real  or  imaginary,  with  Shakespeare's  jour- 
neys from  the  Capital  to  his  home  in  New  Place. 
The  beautiful  university  city  was  even  then  ven- 
erable with  years  and  thronged  with  students. 
Shakespeare's  infinite  wit  and  marvellous  charm, 
to  which  there  are  many  contemporary  testimonies, 
made  him  later  a  welcome  companion  in  one  of  the 
most  brilliant  groups  of  men  in  the  history  of  litera- 
ture. The  spell  of  Oxford  must  have  been  upon 
him,  and  volumes  of  biography  might  well  be  ex- 
changed for  a  brief  account  of  one  evening  in  the 
commons  room  of  some  college  when  the  greatest 
and  most  companionable  of  English  men  of  genius 
was  the  guest  of  scholars  who  shared  with  him 
the  liberating  power  of  the  new  age ;  for  Shake- 
speare was  loved  by  men  of  gentle  breeding  and  of 
ripest  culture. 


94  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Dickens  once  said  that  if  he  sat  in  a  room  five 
minutes,  without  consciously  taking  note  of  his 
surroundings,  he  found  himself  able,  by  the  instinc- 


THE   ZOUST   PORTRAIT   OF  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE. 
Now  in  the  possession  of  Sir  John  Lister-Kaye  of  the  Grange,  Wakefield. 

tive  action  of  his  mind,  to  describe  the  furnishing 
of  the  room  to  the  smallest  detail.  This  faculty  of 
what  may  be  called  instinctive  observation  Shake- 


MARRIAGE   AND    LONDON  95 

speare  possessed  in  rare  degree  ;  he  saw  everything 
when  he  seemed  to  be  seeing  nothing.  It  is  not 
impossible  that,  as  Aubrey  declares,  "  he  happened 
to  take  the  humour  of  the  constable  in  '  Midsum- 
mer Night's  Dream '  in  a  little  town  near  Oxford." 
There  is  no  constable  in  Shakespeare's  single  fairy- 
play,  and  Aubrey  was  probably  thinking  of  Dog- 
berry or  Verges.  Shakespeare  was  constantly 
"  taking  the  humour  "  of  men  and  women  wherever 
he  found  himself,  and  although  Oxford  is  connected 
with  his  life  only  by  a  faint  tradition,  it  may  have 
furnished  him  with  more  than  one  sketch  which  he 
later  developed  into  a  figure  full  of  reality  and  sub- 
stance. It  would  have  been  quite  in  keeping  with 
the  breadth  and  freedom  of  his  genius  to  find  a 
clown  in  Oxford  more  interesting  than  some  of  the 
scholars  he  met ;  for  clowns  occasionally  have  some 
touch  of  individuality,  some  glimmer  of  humour, 
while  scholars  are  sometimes  found  without  flavour, 
pungency,  or  originality.  Shakespeare's  principle 
of  selection  in  dealing  with  men  was  always  vital ; 
he  put  his  hand  unerringly  on  significant  persons. 
In  1586  he  reached  London,  without  means,  in 
search  of  a  vocation  and  a  place  in  which  to  exer- 
cise it.  The  time  was  fortunate,  and  cooperated 
with  him  in  ways  which  he  did  not,  then  or  later, 
understand ;  for,  however  clearly  a  man  may  com- 
prehend his  gift  and  master  his  tools,  he  is  too 
much  a  part  of  his  age  to  discern  his  spiritual 
relations  to  it  as  these  are  later  disclosed  in  the 


96  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

subtle  channels  through  which  it  inspires  and 
vitalizes  him,  and  he  in  turn  expresses,  interprets, 
and  affects  it. 

To  the  youth  from  the  little  village  on  the  Avon, 
London  was  a  great  and  splendid  city;  but  the 
vast  metropolis  of  to-day,  with  a  population  of 
more  than  five  million  people,  was  then  a  town  of 
about  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  inhabitants. 
The  great  fire  which  was  to  change  it  from  a 
mediaeval  to  a  modern  city  was  almost  a  century 
distant;  and  the  spire  of  old  St.  Paul's  was  seen, 
as  one  approached,  rising  over  masses  of  red-roofed, 
many-gabled  houses,  crowded  into  the  smallest 
space,  and  protected  by  walls  and  trenches.  The 
most  conspicuous  objects  in  the  city  were  the 
Tower,  which  rose  beside  the  Thames  as  a  symbol 
of  the  personal  authority  of  the  monarch;  the 
Cathedral,  which  served  as  a  common  centre  of 
community  life,  where  the  news  of  the  day  was 
passed  from  group  to  group,  where  gossip  was 
freely  interchanged,  and  servants  were  hired,  and 
debtors  found  immunity  from  arrest;  and  old 
London  Bridge,  a  town  in  itself,  lined  with  build- 
ings, crowded  with  people,  with  high  gate-towers 
at  either  end,  often  ghastly  with  the  heads  that 
had  recently  fallen  from  the  block  at  the  touch  of 
the  executioner's  axe. 

The  streets  were  narrow,  irregular,  overhung  with 
projecting  signs  which  creaked  on  rusty  hinges  and, 
in  high  winds,  often  came  down  on  the  heads  of 


MARRIAGE   AND  LONDON  97 

unfortunate  pedestrians.  These  highways  were 
still  foul  with  refuse  and  evil  odours ;  within  the 
memory  of  men  then  living  they  had  been  entirely 
unpaved.  Their  condition  had  become  so  noisome 
and  dangerous  fifty  years  earlier  that  Henry  VIII. 
began  the  work  of  paving  the  principal  Borough- 
fares.  Round  stones  were  used  for  this  purpose, 
and  were  put  in  position  as  they  came  to  hand, 
without  reference  to  form,  size,  or  regularity  of  sur- 
face. Walking  and  riding  were,  in  consequence, 
equally  disagreeable.  The  thoroughfares  were 
beaten  into  dust  in  summer  and  hollowed  out  into 
pools  in  winter ;  a  ditch,  picturesquely  called  "  the 
kennel,"  ran  through  the  road  and  served  as  a 
gutter.  Into  these  running  streams,  fed  with  the 
refuse  which  now  goes  through  the  sewers,  horses 
splashed  and  pedestrians  often  slipped.  The  narrow 
passage  for  foot-passengers  was  overcrowded,  and 
every  one  sought  the  space  farthest  away  from  the 
hurrying  pedestrians  and  litter-carriers  and  reckless 
riders.  Two  centuries  later  Dr.  Johnson  divided 
the  inhabitants  of  London  into  two  classes  —  the 
peaceable  and  the  quarrelsome,  or  those  who  "  gave 
the  wall "  and  those  who  took  it.  To  add  to  the 
discomfort,  great  water-spouts  gathered  the  showers 
as  they  fell  on  the  roofs  of  houses  and  shops,  and 
discharged  them  in  concentrated  form  on  the  heads 
of  passers-by. 

The  London  of  that  day  was  the  relatively  small 
and  densely  populated   area  in   the   heart   of  the 


98  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

modern  metropolis  which  is  known  as  the  City. 
Its  centre  was  St.  Paul's  Cathedral  ;  and  Eastcheap, 
which  Falstaff  loved  so  well,  was  a  typical  thorough- 
fare. A  labyrinth  of  foul  alleys  and  dingy,  noisome 
courts  covered  the  space  now  penetrated  by  the 
most  crowded  streets.  Outside  the  limits  of  the 
town  stretched  lonely,  neglected  fields,  dangerous 
at  night  by  reason  of  footpads  and  all  manner  of 
lawless  persons,  in  an  age  when  streets  were  un- 
lighted  and  police  unknown.  St.  Pancras,  sur- 
rounded by  its  quiet  fields,  was  a  lonely  place  with 
extensive  rural  views  in  all  directions.  Westmin- 
ster was  separated  from  the  city  by  a  long  stretch 
of  country  known  later  as  the  Downs ;  cows  grazed 
in  Gray's  Inn  Fields. 

The  Thames  was  the  principal  thoroughfare  be- 
tween London  and  Westminster,  and  was  gay  with 
barges  and  boats  of  every  kind,  and  noisy  with  the 
cries  and  oaths  of  hundreds  of  watermen.  The 
vocabulary  of  profanity  and  vituperation  was  nowhere 
richer ;  every  boat's  load  on  its  way  up  or  down  the 
stream  abused  every  other  boat's  load  in  passing; 
the  shouts  "  Eastward  Ho !  "  or  "  Westward  Ho  !  " 
were  deafening. 

In  1586  London  was  responding  to  the  impetus 
which  rapidly  increasing  trade  had  given  the  whole 
country,  and  was  fast  outgrowing  its  ancient  limits. 
Neither  the  Tudor  nor  the  Stuart  sovereigns  looked 
with  favour  on  the  growth  of  the  power  of  a  com- 
munity which  was  never  lacking  in  the  indepen- 


MARRIAGE   AND   LONDON 


99 


dence  which  comes  from  civic  courage  and  civic 
wealth.  James  I.  said,  with  characteristic  pedantry, 
that  "  the  growth  of  the  capital  resembleth  that  of 
the  head  of  a  rickety  child,  in  which  an  excessive 


OLD    LONDON    BRIDGE. 
From  an  old  print. 


influx  of  humours  draweth  and  impoverisheth  the 
extremities,  and  at  the  same  time  generateth  dis- 
temper in  the  overloaded  parts."  The  instinct 
which  warned  the  father  of  Charles  I.  against  the 
growth  of  London  was  sound,  as  the  instincts  of 


100  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

James  often  were ;  but  there  was  no  power  within 
reach  of  the  sovereign  which  could  check  the  growth 
of  the  great  city  of  the  future.  That  growth  was 
part  of  the  expansion  of  England ;  one  evidence  of 
that  rising  tide  of  racial  vitality  which  was  to  carry 
the  English  spirit,  genius,  and  activity  to  the  ends 
of  the  earth. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE   LONDON    STAGE 

A  YOUTH  of  Shakespeare's  genius  and  charm  of 
nature  needed  only  a  bit  of  earth  on  which  to  put 
his  foot  in  the  arena  of  struggle  which  London  was 
in  that  day,  and  still  is,  in  order  to  make  his  way  to 
a  secure  position.  That  bit  of  ground  from  which 
he  could  push  his  fortunes  forward  was  probably 
afforded  by  his  friendship  with  Richard  Field,  a 
Stratford  boy  who  had  bound  himself,  after  the 
custom  of  the  time,  to  Thomas  Vautrollier,  a  printer 
and  publisher  in  Blackfriars,  not  far  from  the  two 
theatres  then  in  existence,  The  Theatre  and  The 
Curtain.  Richard  was  the  son  of  "  Henry  ffelde  of 
Stratford  uppon  Aven  in  the  countye  of  Warwick, 
tanner,"  a  friend  of  John  Shakespeare.  Young 
Field,  who  had  recently  ended  his  apprenticeship, 
came  into  the  possession  of  the  business  by  mar- 
riage about  this  time,  and  his  name  will  always  be 
kept  in  memory  because  his  imprint  appears  on  the 
earliest  of  Shakespeare's  publications,  the  "  Venus 
and  Adonis,"  which  was  first  issued  in  1593  and 
reissued  in  1594  and  1596;  and  on  the  title-page  of 
"  The  Rape  of  Lucrece  "  in  1594.  The  relation  of 
this  printer  and  his  predecessor  to  the  poet  was 

101 


Tb'2  |  j  WSLTJAM   SHAKESPEARE 

intimate  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word :  Field  not 
only  gave  to  the  world  Shakespeare's  earliest  poems, 
but  brought  out  several  books  which  deeply  influ- 
enced the  young  poet ;  in  1589  he  printed  Putten- 
ham's  "  Arte  of  English  Poesie  "  and  fifteen  books 
of  Ovid's  "  Metamorphoses  " ;  and  he  brought  out 
at  least  five  editions  of  North's  translation  of  Plu- 
tarch's "  Lives,"  that  "  pasturage  of  noble  minds," 
upon  which  Shakespeare  must  have  fastened  with 
avidity,  so  completely  did  his  imagination  penetrate 
and  possess  Plutarch's  great  stories. 

The  theory  that  Shakespeare  worked  for  a  time 
in  the  printing  establishment  is  pure  surmise; 
there  is  not  even  tradition  to  support  it.  Friend- 
ship with  James  Burbage,  one  of  the  leading  actors 
of  the  day,  with  whom  Shakespeare  became  inti- 
mately associated,  has  been  taken  for  granted  on  the 
assumption  that  Burbage  was  a  man  of  Stratford 
birth  ;  and  on  the  same  ground  it  has  been  assumed 
that  he  knew  John  Heminge,  who  became  at  a  later 
time  his  associate  and  friend ;  it  is  improbable, 
however,  that  either  of  these  successful  actors  was  a 
native  of  Warwickshire.  Nor  is  there  good  ground 
for  the  surmise  that  the  poet  began  his  career  as  a 
lawyer's  clerk  ;  his  knowledge  of  legal  terms,  con- 
siderable as  it  was,  is  more  reasonably  accounted 
for  on  other  grounds. 

Tradition  is  doubtless  to  be  trusted  when  it  con- 
nects Shakespeare  from  the  beginning  of  his  career 
with  the  profession  which  he  was  later  not  only  to 


THE   LONDON   STAGE  103 

follow  with  notable  practical  success,  but  to  prac- 
tise with  the  insight  and  skill  of  the  artist.  His 
mastery  of  the  mechanism  of  the  play  as  well  as 
of  its  poetic  resources  was  so  complete  that  his 
apprenticeship  must  have  begun  at  once.  Assum- 
ing that  he  connected  himself  with  the  "theatre  at 
the  very  start,  that  period  of  preparation  was  amaz- 
ingly brief.  It  is  highly  probable  that  the  stories 
which  associate  him  with  the  theatre  in  the  hum- 
blest way  are  true  in  substance  if  not  in  detail.  The 
best  known  of  these  is  that  which  declares  that 
he  began  by  holding,  during  the  performances,  the 
horses  of  those  who  rode  to  the  theatres.  It  was 
the  custom  of  men  of  fashion  to  ride ;  Shakespeare 
lived  in  the  near  neighbourhood  of  both  theatres; 
and  James  Burbage,  the  father  of  Shakespeare's 
friend  the  actor,  was  not  only  the  owner  of  The 
Theatre,  but  of  a  livery  stable  close  at  hand,  and 
may  have  given  him  employment.  This  story  first 
appeared  in  print  in  1753,  and  it  was  then  an  old 
tradition.  The  poet  was  not  long  in  finding  his  way 
from  the  outside  to  the  inside  of  the  theatre. 

If  he  did  not  attain  eminence  as  an  actor,  he  knew 
the  stage  business  and  the  management  of  a  theatre 
from  first-hand  knowledge,  and  down  to  the  minut- 
est detail.  No  man  has  ever  kept  the  theory  and 
the  practice  of  an  art  more  thoroughly  in  hand  or  in 
harmony.  The  plays  hold  the  first  place  in  poetry 
to-day  because  their  literary  quality  and  value  are 
supreme;  they  were  successful  in  the  poet's  time 


104  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

largely  because  they  showed  such  mastery  of  the 
business  of  the  playwright.  Shakespeare  the  crafts- 
man and  Shakespeare  the  artist  were  ideal  collabo- 
rators. Rowe's  statement  that  "  he  was  received  into 
the  company  then  in  being  at  first  in  a  very  mean 
rank  "  has  behind  it  two  credible  and  probable  tra- 
ditions :  the  story  that  he  entered  the  theatre  as  a 
mere  attendant  or  servitor,  and  the  story  that  his 
first  service  in  his  profession  was  rendered  in  the 
humble  capacity  of  a  call-boy.  The  nature  of  the 
work  he  had  to  do  at  the  start  was  of  no  consequence; 
what  is  of  importance  is  the  fact  that  it  gave  him 
a  foothold;  henceforth  he  had  only  to  climb;  and 
climbing,  to  a  man  of  his  gifts  and  temper,  was  not. 
toil  but  play. 

Shakespeare  began  as  an  actor,  and  did  not  cease 
to  act  until  toward  the  close  of  his  life.  His  success 
as  a  playwright  soon  overshadowed  his  reputation 
as  an  actor,  but,  either  as  actor  or  shareholder,  he 
kept  in  closest  touch  with  the  practical  and  business 
side  of  the  theatre.  He  was  for  many  years  a  man 
of  great  prominence  and  influence  in  what  would 
to-day  be  known  as  theatrical  circles;  and  while  his 
success  on  the  stage  was  only  respectable,  his  suc- 
cess as  shareholder  and  manager  was  of  the  most 
substantial  kind.  It  is  clear  that  he  inherited  his 
father's  instinct  for  business  activity,  and  much  more 
than  his  father's  share  of  sound  judgment  and  wise 
management.  His  good  sense  stands  out  at  every 
stage  in  his  mature  life  in  striking  juxtaposition  with 


THE   LONDON   STAGE  1 05 

his  immense  capacity  for  emotion  and  excess  both  of 
passion  and  of  brooding  meditation.  His  poise  and 
serenity  of  spirit  were  shown  in  his  dealing  with 
practical  affairs ;  and  his  success  as  a  man  of  affairs 
is  not  only  a  rare  fact  in  the  history  of  men  of  gen- 
ius, but  stood  in  close  relation  to  his  marvellous 
sanity  of  nature.  He  steadied  his  spirit  by  resolute 
and  wholesome  grasp  of  realities. 

It  was  a  rough  school  in  which  Shakespeare  found 
himself  in  the  years  of  his  apprenticeship;  the  pro- 
fession he  chose,  although  associated  in  our  minds, 
when  we  recall  his  time,  with  some  of  the  gentlest 
as  well  as  the  most  ardent  and  gifted  spirits,  was  not 
yet  reputable ;  the  society  into  which  he  was  thrown 
by  it  was  bohemian,  if  not  worse;  and  the  atmos- 
phere in  which  he  worked,  but  which  he  seemed  not 
to  breathe,  was  full  of  passion,  intrigue,  and  license. 
No  occupation  is  so  open  to  moral  peril  as  that 
which  constantly  stimulates  the  great  passions  and 
evokes  the  great  emotions ;  and  in  Shakespeare's 
time  the  stage  hardly  felt  the  steadying  force  of  pub- 
lic opinion.  Lying  under  a  social  ban,  it  paid  small 
attention  to  the  standards  and  tastes  of  serious- 
minded  men  and  women.  The  theatre  of  Shake- 
speare's time  owed  its  immense  productiveness  to 
the  closeness  of  its  relations  with  English  life  and 
the  English  people,  but  that  very  closeness  of  touch 
charged  it  with  perilous  forces ;  the  stage  was  the 
scene  of  tumultuous  passions,  of  fierce  emotions 
whose  tidal  volume  and  intensity  swept  everything 


106  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

before  them;  of  violence,  cruelty,  and  bloodshedding. 
The  intense  vitality  which  gave  the  age  its  creative 
energy  in  statesmanship,  in  adventure,  in  organiza- 
tion, and  in  literature,  showed  itself  in  perilous 
excesses  of  thought  and  conduct ;  the  people, 
although  morally  sound,  were  coarse  in  speech ;  the 
vices  of  the  Italian  Renaissance  did  not  seriously 
taint  the  English  people,  but  they  were  familiar  on 
the  English  stage;  the  actor  was  not  received  as  a 
member  of  society ;  he  was  still  a  social  outcast. 
Under  such  conditions  the  tragic  fate  of  Shake- 
speare's immediate  predecessors  seems  almost  inevi- 
table ;  and  it  is  a  matter  of  surprise  that  Shake- 
speare's friends  in  his  profession  were  men,  on  the 
whole,  of  orderly  life. 

There  was  ground,  in  the  atmosphere  which  sur- 
rounded the  stage  in  Shakespeare's  youth,  for  the 
growing  opposition  of  the  Puritan  element  in  Lon- 
don to  the  theatre ;  but  fortunately  for  the  free 
expression  of  English  genius,  Elizabeth  was  of 
another  mind.  She,  rather  than  her  Puritan  sub- 
jects, represented  the  temper  and  spirit  of  the  people. 
She  loved  the  play  and  was  the  enthusiastic  patron 
of  the  player.  In  1574,  twelve  years  before  Shake- 
speare came  to  London,  the  Queen  had  given  a 
Royal  Patent,  or  license,  empowering  Lord  Leices- 
ter's servants  to  "  use,  exercise,  and  occupy  the  art 
and  faculty  of  playing  Comedies,  Tragedies,  Inter- 
ludes, Stage-plays  ...  as  well  for  the  recreation  of 
our  loving  subjects,  as  for  our  solace  and  pleasure, 


THE   LONDON   STAGE 


107 


when  we  shall  think  good  to  see  them."  Lord 
Leicester's  company  had  appeared  at  Court  on 
many  occasions ;  henceforth  they  called  themselves 
"  The  Queen's  Majesty's  Poor  Players."  They  were 
given  the  privilege  of  playing,  not  only  in  Lon- 
don, but  through- 
out England ;  but 
the  plays  they 
presented  were  in 
all  cases  to  pass 
under  the  eye  of 
the  Master  of  the 
Revels,  and  no  per- 
formance was  to 
be  given  "  in  the 
time  of  Common 
Prayer,  or  in  the 
time  of  great  and 
common  Plague  in 
our  said  City  of 
London."  Such  a 
license  was  ren- 
dered necessary  by 
an  Act  of  Parlia- 
ment adopted  three  years  earlier;  without  it  the 
players  might  have  been  apprehended  as  vagabonds. 
The  Earl  of  Leicester's  company  of  players  bore 
his  name  and  secured  their  privileges  through  his 
influence,  but  were  not  subsidized  by  him.  Two 
years  after  receiving  the  royal  license,  they  occupied 


ROBERT   DUDLEY,    EARL   OF   LEICESTER. 
From  a  contemporary  crayon  sketch. 


108  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

in  Shoreditch  the  first  public  theatre  erected  in 
London ;  so  widespread  was  the  popular  interest, 
and  so  ripe  the  moment  for  the  development  of  the 
drama,  that  at  the  death  of  Elizabeth  London  had 
no  less  than  fifteen  or  eighteen  playhouses.  When 
Shakespeare  arrived  on  the  scene,  two  theatres  had 
been  built  and  several  companies  of  actors  regularly 
organized.  Choir-boys  frequently  gave  perform- 
ances, and  the  choirs  of  St.  Paul's,  the  Chapel 
Royal,  and  the  school  at  Westminster  were  organ- 
ized into  companies,  furnished  players  for  women's 
parts,  and  practically  served  as  training-schools  for 
the  stage.  Of  these  companies,  that  which  bore  the 
name  of  Lord  Leicester  soon  secured  a  foremost 
place ;  became,  in  the  time  of  Elizabeth's  successor, 
the  King's  Players ;  included  among  its  members 
Richard  Burbage,  the  greatest  tragedian  of  his  time, 
John  Heminge  and  Henry  Condell,  who  laid  pos- 
terity for  all  time  under  lasting  obligations  by  edit- 
ing the  first  folio  edition  of  Shakespeare's  plays  in 
1623,  and  Augustus  Phillips  —  all  Shakespeare's 
intimate  and  lifelong  friends.  With  probably  not 
more  than  two  exceptions,  his  plays  were  first 
brought  out  by  this  company.  With  this  company 
Shakespeare  cast  in  his  fortunes  soon  after  his 
arrival  in  London,  when  it  was  performing  in  The 
Theatre,  with  the  Curtain  as  its  only  rival ;  and  he 
kept  up  his  connection  with  it  until  his  final  retire- 
ment to  Stratford. 

The  first   theatres  were    rude  in    structure    and 


THE   LONDON    STAGE 


109 


bore  evidence  of  the  earlier  conditions  under  which 
plays  had  been  presented.  The  courtyard  of  the 
old  English  inn,  with  its  open  space  surrounded  on 
three  sides  by  galleries,  reappeared  with  modifica- 
tions in  the  earliest  London  theatres.  These 
structures  were  built  of  wood,  and  the  majority  of 
the  audience  sat  in  the  open  space  which  is  now 
known  as  the  orchestra  but  was  then  called  the 


THE   BANKSIDE,   SOUTHWARK,    SHOWING  THE   GLOBE  THEATRE. 
From  Visscher's  "  View  of  London,"  drawn  in  1616. 

u  yard "  and  later  the  pit,  under  the  open  sky. 
The  Globe,  which  was  the  most  famous  theatre  of 
Shakespeare's  time,  and  with  which  his  own  for- 
tunes were  closely  identified,  was  shaped  like  a  hexa- 
gon ;  the  stage  was  covered,  but  the  private  boxes, 
which  encircled  the  central  space  or  yard,  were  not 
roofed.  The  Fortune,  which  stood  in  Cripplegate 
and  was  one  of  the  results  of  the  great  success  of 
the  Globe,  was  a  square  of  eighty  feet  on  each  side. 
The  stage  was  nearly  forty-five  feet  in  depth  ;  three 
tiers  of  boxes  encircled  the  yard.  The  stage  stood 


110  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

upon  pillars  and  was  protected  by  a  roof.  The 
greater  part  of  the  audience  sat  in  the  "  yard  "  and 
were  called  "  groundlings  " ;  those  who  were  able  to 
pay  a  larger  fee  found  places  in  the  boxes  or  gal- 
leries ;  the  men  of  fashion,  with  the  patrons  of  the 
drama,  sat  on  the  stage  itself. 

The  audience  in  the  yard  was  made  up  of  citi- 
zens of  London,  apprentices,  grooms,  boys,  and  a 
more  dissolute  and  boisterous  element  who  paid 
two  or  three  pennies  for  admission.  If  it  rained, 
they  were  wet ;  if  the  sun  shone,  they  were  warm ; 
they  criticised  the  actors  and  ridiculed  the  dandies 
on  the  stage ;  they  ate  and  drank  and  occasionally 
fought  one  another,  after  the  fashion  of  the  time. 
They  were  sometimes  riotous.  When  the  air  of 
the  yard  became  disagreeable,  juniper  was  burned 
to  purify  it/  The  nobles  and  men  of  fashion  paid 
sixpence  or  a  shilling  for  a  three-legged  stool  on 
the  stage.  These  gentlemen,  who  were  dressed,  as 
a  rule,  in  the  extreme  of  the  prevailing  mode,  were 
scornful  of  the  people  in  the  yard,  and  often  made 
themselves  obnoxious  to  the  actors,  with  whose  exits 
and  entrances  they  sometimes  interfered,  and  upon 
whose  performances  they  made  audible  and  often 
insulting  comments.  There  were  no  women  on 
the  stage,  and  few,  and  those  usually  not  of  the  best, 
in  the  boxes. 

The  performances  were  given  at  three  o'clock  in 
the  afternoon,  and  were  announced  by  the  hoisting 
of  flags  and  the  blowing  of  trumpets  —  a  custom 


THE   LONDON   STAGE  III 

which  has  been  revived  in  our  time  at  Bayreuth. 
Playbills  of  a  rude  kind  were  distributed  ;  if  a  trag- 
edy was  to  be  presented,  these  bills  were  printed  in 
red  letters.  In  place  of  the  modern  ushers  were 
boys  who  sold  tobacco,  nuts,  and  various  edibles, 
without  much  attention  to  the  performance  or  the 
performers.  The  stage  was  strewn  with  rushes, 
and  partially  concealed  by  a  curtain.  When  the 
trumpets  had  been  blown  for  the  third  time,  this 
curtain  was  drawn  aside  and  an  actor,  clad  in  a  mantle 
of  black  velvet  and  wearing  a  crown  of  bays  over 
a  capacious  wig,  came  forward  to  recite  the  Pro- 
logue. This  speech  was  often  interrupted  and 
sometimes  ended  by  the  violence  of  the  "ground- 
lings "  or  the  late  arrival  of  some  rakish  gentleman 
upon  the  stage.  The  people  in  the  yard  were,  as  a 
rule,  more  respectful  to  the  plays  and  players  than 
those  on  the  stage. 

The  costumes  were  often  rich,  and  the  stage  was 
not  devoid  of  gorgeous  properties ;  'but  the  scenery 
was  of  the  simplest  and  rudest  description,  and  the 
stage  devices  were  elementary  and  transparent. 
The  stage  was  narrow,  projected  into  the  audience, 
was  partly  filled  by  spectators,  and  was  open  to 
view  on  all  sides  save  at  the  back.  There  were 
crude  representations  of  rocks,  trees,  animals,  cities. 
A  placard  on  the  walls  of  one  of  these  wholly  unde- 
ceptive  cities  announced  that  it  was  Verona  or 
Athens  or  Rome ;  the  audience  needed  nothing 
more ;  a  hint  to  the  imagination  was  enough. 


112  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

"  You  shall  have  Asia  of  the  one  side,  and 
Africka  of  the  other,"  writes  Sir  Philip  Sidney, 
"  and  so  many  other  under-kingdoms,  that  the 
Plaier  when  he  comes  in,  must  ever  begin  with  tell- 
ing where  hee  is,  or  else  the  tale  will  not  be  con- 
ceived. Now  shall  you  have  three  Ladies  walke  to 
gather  flowers,  and  then  wee  must  beleeve  the  stage 
to  be  a  garden.  By  and  by  we  heare  newes  of  ship- 
wracke  in  the  same  place,  then  wee  are  to  blame  if 
we  accept  it  not  for  a  rocke ;  ...  in  the  meane 
time  two  armies  flie  in,  represented  with  foure 
swordes  and  bucklers,  and  then  what  hard  heart 
will  not  receive  it  for  a  pitched  field  ?  " 

Against  a  background  so  meagre,  heroes  rode  in 
on  hobby-horses,  and  young  women,  whose  chins 
were  not  always  as  closely  shaven  as  they  might 
have  been,  were  frightened  by  pasteboard  dragons 
of  the  simplest  devices ;  and  yet  no  one  was  made 
ridiculous,  and  the  disparity  between  the  stage  and 
the  action  was  not  perceived !  The  imagination  is 
more  subtle  than  the  most  skilful  stage  carpenter, 
and  more  vividly  creative  than  the  greatest  stage 
artist.  "  The  recitation  begins,"  wrote  Emerson ; 
"  one  golden  word  leaps  out  immortal  from  all  this 
painted  pedantry  and  sweetly  torments  us  with 
invitations  to  its  own  inaccessible  homes." 

This  absence  of  visible  scenery  imposed  on  the 
dramatist  the  task  not  only  of  creating  the  plot  and 
action,  but  the  background  of  his  play;  and  much 
of  the  most  exquisite  poetry  in  our  language  was 


THE   LONDON   STAGE  113 

written  to  set  before  the  imagination  that  which  the 
theatre  could  not  set  before  the  eye.  The  narrow 
stage  with  its  poor  devices  was  but  the  vantage- 
ground  from  which  the  poet  took  possession  of  the 
vast  stage,  invisible  but  accessible,  of  the  imagina- 
tion of  his  auditors  ;  on  that  stage  alone,  *in  spite  of 
modern  invention  and  skill,  the  plays  of  Shake- 
speare are  adequately  set. 

The  theatre  was  the  channel  through  which  the 
rising  life  of  the  people  found  expression,  and  accu- 
rately reflected  the  popular  taste,  feeling,  and  cul- 
ture ;  it  was  the  contemporary  library,  lecture-room, 
and  newspaper,  and  gave  expression  to  what  was 
uppermost  in  the  life  of  the  time.  The  drama  was 
saturated  with  the  spirit  of  the  age;  it  was  passionate, 
reckless,  audacious,  adventurous;  indifferent  to  tra- 
dition but  throbbing  with  vitality ;  full  of  sublimity 
when  a  great  poet  was  behind  it,  and  of  rant  and 
bluster  when  it  came  from  a  lesser  hand  ;  it  was 
insolent,  bloody,  vituperative,  coarse,  and  indecent ; 
it  was  noble,  pathetic,  sweet  with  all  tenderness  and 
beautiful  with  all  purity ;  there  was  no  depth  of 
crime  and  foulness  into  which  it  did  not  descend  ; 
there  was  no  height  of  character,  achievement,  sacri- 
fice, and  service  to  which  it  did  not  climb  with  easy 
and  victorious  step.  At  its  best  and  its  worst  it 
was  intensely  alive ;  and  because  it  was  so  intensely 
alive  it  became  not  only  the  greatest  expression  of 
English  genius,  but  the  mirror  of  English  spiritual 
and  social  life. 


114  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

"  Rude  as  the  theatre  might  be,  all  the  world  was 
there,"  writes  Green.  "  The  stage  was  crowded 
with  nobles  and  courtiers.  Apprentices  and  citizens 
thronged  the  benches  in  the  yard  below.  The 
rough  mob  of  the  pit  inspired,  as  it  felt,  the  vigor- 
ous life,  the  rapid  transitions,  the  passionate  energy, 
the  reality,  the  lifelike  medley  and  confusion,  the 
racy  dialogue,  the  chat,  the  wit,  the  pathos,  the  sub- 
limity, the  rant  and  buffoonery,  the  coarse  horrors 
and  vulgar  bloodshedding,  the  immense  range  over 
all  classes  of  society,  the  intimacy  with  the  foulest 
as  well  as  the  fairest  developments  of  human  temper, 
which  characterized  the  English  stage.  The  new 
drama  represented  "  the  very  age  and  body  of  the 
time,  his  form  and  pressure."  The  people  itself 
brought  its  nobleness  and  its  vileness  to  the  boards. 
No  stage  was  ever  so  human,  no  poetic  life  so 
intense.  Wild,  reckless,  defiant  of  all  past  tradi- 
tions, of  all  conventional  laws,  the  English  dramatists 
owned  no  teacher,  no  source  of  poetic  inspiration, 
but  the  people  itself." 

This  vital  relationship  between  the  English  peo- 
ple and  the  English  drama  explains  the  growing 
interest  in  the  stage  during  Shakespeare's  career  as 
actor  and  dramatist,  and  the  prosperity  which 
attended  many  theatrical  ventures  and  notably  his 
own  venture.  When  he  joined  Lord  Leicester's 
company  at  The  Theatre,  which  stood  in  Shoreditch, 
in  the  purlieus  of  the  City,  the  Curtain,  which  was 
a  near  neighbour,  was  ,the  only  rival  for  popular 


THE   LONDON   STAGE 


patronage.  But  these  houses  were  not  long  in 
possession  of  the  field.  The  Rose  was  built  on 
Bankside,  Southwark,  not  far  from  the  tavern  from 


THE   GLOBE   THEATRE. 
From  a  drawing  in  the  illustrated  edition  of  "  Pennant's  London,"  in  the  British  Museum. 

which  Chaucer's  pilgrims  set  out  on  their  immortal 
pilgrimage.  To  this  theatre  Shakespeare's  com- 
pany ultimately  removed,  and  it  is  probable  that  on 


Il6  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

its  narrow  stage  he  began  to  emerge  from  obscurity 
both  as  an  actor  and  a  playwright.  He  had  gone  a 
long  way  on  the  road  to  fame  and  fortune  when 
Richard  Burbage  built  the  Globe  Theatre  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  the  Rose.  Here  his  fortunes  of 
every  kind  touched  their  zenith,  and,  by  reason  of 
his  intimate  association  with  its  early  history,  the 
Globe  has  become  and  is  likely  to  remain  the  most 
famous  theatre  in  the  annals  of  the  English  drama. 
In  the  management  of  the  Globe  Shakespeare  came 
to  hold  a  first  place,  with  a  large  interest  in  its  prof- 
its. It  soon  secured,  and  held  until  it  was  destroyed 
by  fire  in  1613,  the  first  place  in  the  hearts  of  the 
London  public.  Edward  Alleyn  was  the  greatest 
actor  of  his  time  outside  the  company  with  whom 
Shakespeare  associated  himself ;  for  a  time  the  com- 
pany known  as  the  Admiral's  Men,  with  whom  he 
acted,  combined  with  Shakespeare's  company  and 
gave  what  must  have  been  the  most  striking  repre- 
sentations which  English  audiences  had  ever  seen. 
The  two  companies  soon  separated,  however,  and 
the  Fortune  was  built  to  furnish  suitable  accommo- 
dation for  the  Admiral's  Men,  of  whom  Alleyn  was 
the  star;  Shakespeare's  company,  now  generally 
known  as  the  Lord  Chamberlain's  Men,  being  its 
chief  competitor,  with  Richard  Burbage  as  its  lead- 
ing actor,  supported  by  Heminge,  Condell,  Phillips, 
and  Shakespeare.  The  Blackfriars  Theatre,  built 
by  the  elder  Burbage  on  the  site  now  occupied 
by  the  offices  of  the  London  Times  in  Victoria 


THE   LONDON   STAGE  1 1/ 

Street,  was  probably  not  occupied  by  the  Lord 
Chamberlain's  Men  until  the  close  of  Shakespeare's 
life  in  London. 

Shakespeare's    name    appears   on    many  lists   of 
principal  actors  in  his  own   plays,  and   in  at  least 


THE   BEAR-BAITING   GARDEN. 
This  stood  near  the  Globe  Theatre,  Bankside. 

two  of  Ben  Jonson's  plays ;  according  to  Rowe, 
his  most  notable  role  was  that  of  the  Ghost  in 
"  Hamlet";  one  of  his  brothers,  in  old  age,  remem- 
bered the  dramatist's  rendering  of  the  part  of  Adam 
in  "As  You  Like  It";  he  is  reported  to  have 
"played  some  kingly  parts  in  sport."  The  stage 


Il8  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

tradition,  as  expressed  by  an  actor  at  a  later  period, 
declared  that  he  "did  act  exceeding  well."  That  he 
was  not  a  great  actor  is  evident ;  it  was  fortunate  for 
him  and  for  the  world  that  his  aptitude  for  dealing 
with  the  theatre  was  sufficient  to  give  him  ease  and 
competence,  but  not  enough  to  divert  him  from  the 
drama.  His  experience  as  actor  and  manager  put 
him  in  a  position  to  do  his  work  as  poet  and 
dramatist.  He  learned  stage-craft,  which  many 
dramatists  never  understand ;  his  dramatic  instinct 
was  reenforced  by  his  experience  as  an  actor. 
He  must  have  been  an  intelligent  and  careful 
actor,  studious  of  the  subtleties  and  resources  of 
his  art,  keenly  sensitive  to  artistic  quality  in  voice, 
intonation,  gesture,  and  reading.  His  address  to 
the  players  in  "  Hamlet "  is  a  classic  of  dramatic 
criticism. 

That  Shakespeare  kept  in  intimate  relation  with 
the  theatre  as  actor  and  manager  until  1610  or  161 1 
there  is  no  question  ;  his  interest  as  shareholder  was 
probably  kept  up  until  his  death.  In  1596,  when 
he  had  gained  some  reputation,  he  was  living  in 
Southwark,  not  far  from  the  theatres.  The  theatre 
of  the  day  was  crude  and  elementary  in  arrange- 
ment, scenery,  and  the  sense  of  order  and  taste; 
but  there  was  a  vital  impulse  behind  it ;  popular 
interest  was  deepening  in  the  face  of  a  rising  oppo- 
sition ;  and  it  offered  opportunities  of  moderate  for- 
tune. The  companies  into  which  actors  organized 
themselves  were  small,  often  numbering  only  eight 


THE  LONDON   STAGE  1 19 

persons,  and  rarely  exceeding  twelve.  The  men 
who  took  the  inferior  and  subordinate  parts  were 
called  hirelings,  and  were  paid  small  fixed  sums  as 
wages ;  the  actors  were  usually  partners  in  the  en- 
terprise, managing  the  theatres  and  sharing  the 
profits  according  to  an  accepted  scale  of  relative 
importance  and  value. 

The  modern  London  society  season  was  still  in 
the  future,  but  there  seems  to  have  been,  even  at 
that  early  day,  some  easing  of  work  and  activity 
during  the  summer  months,  and  the  various  com- 
panies made  journeys  to  the  smaller  towns.  The 
records  show  that  in  successive  seasons  Shake- 
speare's company  visited,  among  other  places,  Ox- 
ford, Shrewsbury,  Coventry,  Dover,  Bristol,  Bath, 
Rye,  Folkestone.  There  is  every  reason  to  believe 
that  Shakespeare  travelled  with  his  company  on 
these  tours,  and  that  he  became,  in  this  way,  per- 
sonally familiar  with  many  of  the  localities  which 
are  described  in  the  plays. 

The  claim,  more  than  once  vigorously  urged,  that 
Shakespeare  visited  Scotland  with  his  company,  and 
breathed  the  air  of  Inverness,  and  felt  the  loneliness 
of  the  Highland  heaths,  which  gave,  by  their  wild- 
ness,  a  new  note  of  strange  and  awful  tragedy  to  the 
fate  of  Macbeth,  does  not  rest  on  convincing  evi- 
dence. There  is  more  solid  ground  for  the  belief, 
advocated  with  persuasive  force  by  Mr.  George 
Brandes,  that  Shakespeare  travelled  in  Italy  and 
knew  at  first  hand  the  background  of  life  and  land- 


120  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

scape  against  which  many  of  his  most  characteristic 
plays,  both  tragic  and  comic,  are  projected.  Then 
as  now  foreign  tours  were  sometimes  made  by  Eng- 
lish actors,  and  during  the  poet's  life  the  best  works 
of  the  English  drama  were  seen  in  France,  Germany, 
Holland,  Denmark,  and  other  countries ;  the  chief 
patrons  of  the  visiting  artists  being  found  at  the 
various  courts. 

Italy  rilled  a  great  place  in  the  imagination  of 
contemporary  Englishmen ;  it  was  the  birthplace  of 
the  Renaissance,  the  mother  of  the  New  Learning, 
the  home  of  the  young  as  of  the  older  arts.  Its 
strange  and  tragic  history,  repeated  in  miniature  in 
the  lives  of  many  of  its  rulers,  artists,  poets,  and  men 
of  affairs,  threw  a  spell  over  the  young  and  ardent 
spirit  of  a  country  just  emerging  into  clear  con- 
sciousness of  its  own  spirit  and  power;  while  its 
romantic  charm,  its  prodigal  and  lavish  self-surren- 
der to  passion,  stirred  the  most  sensitive  and  gifted 
Englishmen  of  the  time  to  the  depths.  What  Eu- 
rope is  to-day,  in  its  history,  art,  literature,  ripeness 
of  landscape,  and  social  life,  to  the  young  American, 
Italy  was  to  the  young  Englishman  of  Shakespeare's 
time,  and  for  several  later  generations. 

Chaucer  had  gone  to  Italy  for  some  of  his  most 
characteristic  tales;  Wyatt  and  Surrey  had  learned 
the  poetic  art  at  the  hands  of  Italian  singers ;  the 
immediate  predecessors  of  Shakespeare  were  deeply 
touched  by  this  searching  influence,  and  his  in> 
mediate  successors,  Webster  and  Cyril  Tourneur 


THE   LONDON   STAGE  121 

especially,  gave  dramatic  form  to  those  appalling  vio- 
lations of  the  most  sacred  laws  and  relations  of 
life  which  are  the  most  perplexing  aspect  of  the 
psychology  of  the  Renaissance ;  and  it  was  from 
Italy,  where  his  imagination  was  rapidly  expanding 
in  a  genial  air,  that  the  young  Milton  was  called 
home  when  the  clouds  of  civil  strife  began  to 
darken  the  close  of  that  great  day  of  which  Shake- 
speare was  the  master  mind. 

This  home  of  beauty,  history,  art,  romance,  pas- 
sion, and  tragedy  must  have  had  immense  attractive- 
ness for  Shakespeare,  whose  boyhood  studies,  earliest 
reading,  and  first  apprentice  work  as  a  playwright 
brought  him  into  close  contact  with  it.  Many  men 
of  Shakespeare's  acquaintance  had  made  the  jour- 
ney, and  were  constantly  making  it;  it  was  a 
difficult  but  not  a  very  expensive  journey ;  to  visit 
Italy  must  have  seemed  as  necessary  to  Shakespeare, 
as  to  visit  Germany  has  seemed  necessary  to  the 
American  student  of  philosophy  and  science,  and  to 
visit  France  and  the  Italy  of  to-day  to  the  student 
of  art. 

Mr.  Brandes  bases  his  belief  that  Shakespeare 
made  this  journey  on  the  facts  that  there  were,  in 
his  time,  none  of  those  guide-books  and  manuals 
of  various  kinds  which  spread  a  foreign  country  as 
clearly  before  the  mind  of  an  intelligent  student  at 
home  as  a  map  spreads  it  before  the  eye ;  that,  at 
the  time  "  The  Merchant  of  Venice "  appeared, 
no  description  of  the  most  fascinating  of  cities  had 


122  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

seen  the  light  in  England ;  that  the  familiarity  with 
localities,  names,  characteristics,  architecture,  man- 
ners, and  local  customs  shown  in  "  The  Merchant 
of  Venice"  and  in  "  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew" 
could  have  been  gained  only  by  personal  acquaint- 
ance with  the  country  and  the  people. 

On  the  other  hand,  as  Mr.  Brandes  frankly  con- 
cedes, there  are  mistakes  in  "  Romeo  and  Juliet,"  in 
"  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  and  in  "  Othello  " 
which  are  not  easy  to  reconcile  with  first-hand 
knowledge  of  the  localities  described.  It  must  be 
remembered,  too,  that  the  poet  had  immense  capa- 
city for  assimilating  knowledge  and  making  it  his 
own ;  that  a  social  or  moral  fact  was  as  full  of  sug- 
gestion to  him  as  a  bone  to  a  naturalist;  that  he 
lived  with  men  whose  acquaintance  with  other  coun- 
tries he  was  constantly  drawing  upon  to  enlarge  his 
own  information ;  and  that  he  had  access  to  books 
which  gave  the  freshest  and  most  vivid  descriptions 
of  Italian  scenery,  cities,  and  manners.  Many  of  the 
striking  and  accurate  descriptions  of  localities  to  be 
found  in  literature  were  written  by  men  who  never 
set  foot  in  the  countries  with  which  they  seem  to 
show  the  utmost  familiarity.  One  of  the  most 
charming  of  American  pastorals  describes,  with  com- 
plete accuracy  of  detail  as  well  as  with  the  truest 
feeling  for  atmospheric  effect,  a  landscape  which 
the  poet  never  saw.  On  a  fortunate  day  he  brought 
into  his  library  a  man  who  knew  no  other  country 
so  well.  He  faced  his  visitor  to  the  north.  "  You 


THE   "BLACK   BUST"    OF    SHAKESPEARE. 
From  a  plaster  cast  of  the  original  terra-cotta  bust  owned  by  the  Garrick  Club,  London 


124  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

are  now,"  he  said,  "standing  by  the  blacksmith's 
forge  and  looking  to  the  north :  tell  me  everything 
you  see."  The  visitor  closed  his  eyes  and  described 
with  loving  minuteness  a  country  with  which  he 
had  been  intimate  all  his  conscious  life.  When  he 
had  finished,  he  wras  turned  successively  to  the 
west,  the  south,  and  the  east,  until  his  graphic  vision 
had  surveyed  and  reported  the  distant  and  beautiful 
world  which  was  to  furnish  the  background  for  the 
poem.  The  process  and  the  result  are  incompre- 
hensible to  critics  and  students  who  are  devoid  of 
imagination,  but  perfectly  credible  to  all  who  under- 
stand that  such  an  imagination  as  Shakespeare  pos- 
sessed carries  with  it  the  power  of  seeing  with  the 
eyes  not  only  of  the  living  but  even  of  the  dead. 

Shakespeare  may  have  visited  Italy  during  the 
winter  of  1592  or  the  spring  of  1593,  when  Lon- 
don was  stricken  with  the  plague  and  the  theatres 
were  closed  as  a  precaution  against  the  spread  of 
the  disease  by  contagion,  but  there  is  no  direct 
evidence  of  such  a  visit ;  his  name  does  not  appear 
on  any  existing  list  of  actors  who  made  foreign 
tours.  It  is  a  fact  of  some  significance  in  this  con- 
nection that  the  actors  who  made  professional 
journeys  to  the  Continent  were  rarely  men  of  im- 
portance in  their  profession. 


CHAPTER  VI 

APPRENTICESHIP 

« 

PROBABLY  no  conditions  could  have  promised  less 
for  the  production  of  great  works  of  art  than  those 
which  surrounded  the  theatre  in  Shakespeare's  time 
—  conditions  so  unpromising  that  the  bitter  antag- 
onism of  the  Puritans  is  easily  understood.  It 
remains  true,  nevertheless,  that  in  their  warfare 
against  the  theatre  the  Puritans  were  not  only  con- 
tending with  one  of  the  deepest  of  human  instincts, 
but  unconsciously  and  unavailingly  setting  them- 
selves against  the  freest  and  deepest  expression  of 
English  genius  and  life.  The  story  of  the  growth 
of  the  drama  in  the  Elizabethan  age  furnishes  a  strik- 
ing illustration  of  the  difficulty  of  discerning  at  any 
given  time  the  main  currents  of  spiritual  energy, 
and  of  separating  the  richest  and  most  masterful 
intellectual  life  from  the  evil  conditions  through 
which  it  is  often  compelled  to  work  its  way,  and 
from  the  corrupt  accessories  which  sometimes  sur- 
round it.  The  growth  of  humanity  is  not  the 
unfolding  of  an  idea  in  a  world  of  pure  ideality ;  it 
is  something  deeper  and  more  significant :  it  is  an 
outpouring  of  a  vast  energy,  constantly  seeking  new 
channels  of  expression  and  new  ways  of  action,  pain- 
fully striving  to  find  a  balance  between  its  passion- 

125 


126  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

ate  needs  and  desires  and  the  conditions  under 
which  it  is  compelled  to  work,  and  painfully  adjust- 
ing its  inner  ideals  and  spiritual  necessities  to  out- 
ward realities. 

It  is  this  endeavour  to  give  complete  play  to  the 
force  of  personality,  and  to  harmonize  this  incalcu- 
lable spiritual  energy  with  the  conditions  which 
limit  and  oppose  free  development,  which  gives  the 
life  of  every  age  its  supreme  interest  and  tragic  sig- 
nificance, and  which  often  blinds  the  courageous 
and  sincere,  who  are  bent  on  immediate  righteous- 
ness along  a  few  lines  of  faith  and  practice,  rather 
than  on  a  full  and  final  unfolding  of  the  human 
spirit  in  accordance  with  its  own  needs  and  laws,  to 
the  richest  and  most  fruitful  movement  of  contem- 
porary life.  The  attempt  to  destroy  a  new  force  or 
form  in  the  manifold  creative  energy  of  the  human 
spirit  because  it  was  at  the  start  allied  with  evil  con- 
ditions has  often  been  made  in  entire  honesty  of  pur- 
pose, but  has  been  rarely  successful ;  for  the  vital 
force  denied  one  channel,  finds  another.  The  thea- 
tre in  Shakespeare's  time  was  a  product  of  a  very 
crude  and  coarse  but  very  rich  life ;  it  served,  not  to 
create  evil  conditions,  but  to  bring  those  already 
existing  into  clear  light.  The  Puritans  made  the 
familiar  mistake  of  striking  at  the  expression  rather 
than  at  the  cause  of  social  evils ;  they  laid  a  heavy 
hand  on  a  normal  and  inevitable  activity  instead  of 
fastening  upon  and  stripping  away  the  demoralizing 
influences  which  gathered  about  it. 


APPRENTICESHIP  I  2  7 

Shakespeare  came  at  the  last  hour  which  could 
have  made  room  for  him ;  twenty-five  years  later  he 
would  have  been  denied  expression,  or  his  free  and 
comprehensive  genius  would  have  suffered  serious 
distortion.  The  loveliness  of  Milton's  earlier  lyrics 
reflects  the  joyousness  and  freedom  of  tRe  golden 
age  of  English  dramatic  poetry.  The  Puritan  tem- 
per was  silently  or  noisily  spreading  through  the 
whole  period  of  Shakespeare's  career ;  within  twenty- 
five  years  after  his  death  it  had  closed  the  theatres 
and  was  making  a  desperate  fight  for  the  right  to 


THE   BANKSIDE,    SOUTHWARK,    SHOWING   THE   SWAN   THEATRE. 
From  Visscher's  "  View  of  London,"  drawn  in  1616. 

live  according  to  conscience.  Shakespeare  arrived 
on  the  stage  when  the  great  schism  which  was  to 
divide  the  English  people  had  not  gone  beyond  the 
stage  of  growing  divergence  of  social  and  religious 
ideals ;  there  was  still  a  united  England. 

The  London  theatres  stood  in  suburbs  which 
would  to-day  be  called  slums ;  when  complaint  was 
made  of  the  inconvenience  of  these  outlying  situa- 


128  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

tions,  it  was  promptly  affirmed  that  "  the  remedy 
is  ill-conceived  to  bring  them  into  London ; "  in 
regard  to  the  regulation  that  performances  should 
not  be  given  during  prayer-time,  "it  may  be  noted 
how  uncomely  it  is  for  youth  to  run  straight  from 
prayers  to  plays,  from  God's  service  to  the  Devil's." 
The  theatres  had  come  into  existence  under  the 
most  adverse  conditions,  but  they  had  established 
themselves  because  there  was  a  genuine  force 
behind  them.  They  had  already  touched  the  Eng- 
lish spirit  with  definite  influences.  In  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth's  reactionary  sister  the  freedom  with 
which  the  stage,  the  predecessor  of  the  newspaper 
as  a  means  of  spreading  popular  opinion  and  dis- 
cussing questions  of  popular  interest,  had  spoken 
had  brought  first  more  rigid  censorship  and  finally 
suppression  of  secular  dramas  throughout  England. 
The  court  and  the  nobles  reserved  the  privilege  of 
witnessing  plays  in  palaces  and  castles,  but  the 
play  was  too  frank,  in  the  judgment  of  many,  to 
be  allowed  to  speak  to  the  people.  The  people 
were  not,  however,  to  be  denied  that  which  the 
higher  classes  found  essential ;  regulations  were 
eluded  or  disregarded,  and  plays  were  given 
secretly. 

When  Elizabeth  came  to  the  throne,  the  rules 
imposed  on  players  were  regulative  rather  than 
prohibitory;  for  Elizabeth  had  no  mind  to  put 
under  royal  ban  one  of  the  chief  means  of  easing 
the  popular  feeling  by  giving  it  expression,  and 


APPRENTICESHIP 


129 


of  developing  true  English  feeling  by  the  presenta- 
tion of  the  chief  figures  and  the  most  significant 
events  in  English  history.  Companies  were  organ- 
ized and  licensed  

under  the  patronage 
of  noblemen ;  theatres 
were  built,  and  the 
drama  became  a  rec- 
ognized form  of 
amusement  in  Lon- 
don. But  from  the 
beginning  the  theatre 
was  opposed  and  de- 
nounced. Archbishop 
Grindall  fought  it 
vigorously,  on  the 
ground  that  actors 
were  "  an  idle  sort 
of  people,  which  had 
been  infamous  in  all 
good  common- 
wealths,"  and  that 
the  crowds  which  at- 
tended the  perform- 
ances spread  the 
plague  by  which  Lon- 
don was  ravaged  for 
a  number  of  years,  and  of  which  there  was  great 
and  well-founded  dread.  In  spite  of  the  Queen's 
favour  and  of  Leicester's  patronage,  theatres  were 


QUEEN    ELIZABETH    ENTHRONED. 
From  a  rare  old  print. 


130  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

compelled  to  take  refuge  in  the  suburbs.  The  strug- 
gle between  the  players,  backed  by  the  Queen,  and 
the  City  authorities  was  long  and  bitter.  The  Cor- 
poration was  determined  to  exclude  players  from  the 
City,  and  to  prevent  them  from  giving  performances 
during  service  hours,  on  holidays,  or  during  the  prev- 
alence of  the  plague.  Bitter  as  the  struggle  was, 
however,  neither  side  was  willing  to  carry  it  to  a  de- 
cisive issue.  The  Queen,  who  knew  to  a  nicety  how 
far  she  could  go  in  asserting  the  royal  prerogatives, 
had  no  desire  to  antagonize  a  community  of  grow- 
ing importance  and  power,  and  exceedingly  jealous 
of  its  rights  and  privileges  ;  the  City  had  no  wish 
to  set  itself  in  final  opposition  to  that  which  a  pow- 
erful sovereign  evidently  had  very  much  at  heart. 
The  players  ceased  to  give  regular  performances 
'within  the  City  limits,  but  became,  in  consequence 
of  this  opposition,  a  permanent  feature  of  the  life 
of  the  metropolis  by  building  permanent  buildings 
within  easy  reach  of  the  City. 

And  the  theatre  throve  in  the  face  of  an  opposi- 
tion which  ceased  to  be  official  only  to  become 
more  general  and  passionate.  The  pamphlet, 
which  was  soon  to  come  from  the  press  in  great 
numbers  and  to  do  the  work  of  the  newspaper, 
began  to  arraign  it  in  no  measured  tones;  the  Puri- 
tan preachers  were  unsparing  in  their  denuncia- 
tions. "  It  is  a  woful  sight,"  said  one  of  these 
pamphleteers,  "  to  see  two  hundred  proud  players 
jet  in  their  silks,  when  five  hundred  poor  people 


APPRENTICESHIP  13 1 

starve  in  the  streets."  It  does  not  appear  to  have 
occurred  to  this  critic  of  the  play  that  whatever 
force  his  statement  had,  weighed  equally  on  the 
court,  the  nobility,  and  the  very  respectable  but  also 
very  prosperous  burghers  who  jostled  the  same 
poor  on  their  way  to  church.  There  is  rrmre  point 
in  the  frank  oratory  of  a  London  preacher  in  1586, 
the  year  of  Shakespeare's  arrival  in  London:  "Woe 
is  me!  the  playhouses  are  pestered,  where  churches 
are  naked ;  at  the  one  it  is  not  possible  to  get  a 
place,  at  the  other  void  seats  are  plenty.  When 
the  bell  tolls  to  the  Lecturer,  the  trumpets  sound 
to  the  stages." 

The  opposition  of  the  City  to  the  theatres  was 
later  merged  into  the  opposition  of  the  Puritan 
party ;  and  when  that  party  became  dominant,  the 
theatre  was  suppressed,  with  all  other  forms  of 
amusement  and  recreation  which  the  hand  of 
authority  could  touch ;  for  the  Puritan,  bent  on 
immediate  righteousness  and  looking  with  stern 
and  searching  eye  at  present  conditions,  did  not 
discern  the  significance  of  the  drama  as  an  art,  and 
as  an  expression  of  the  genius  of  the  English  peo- 
ple. With  the  Puritan  party  the  vital  character 
and  force  of  the  English  people  for  a  time  allied 
themselves,  and  the  right  to  live  freely  and  accord- 
ing to  individual  conscience  was  finally  secured  ; 
but,  as  often  happens,  the  arts  of  peace,  giving  full 
play  to  the  spiritual  life  in  the  large  sense,  were 
misunderstopcl,  denied,  and  largely  suppressed  dur- 


132  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

ing  the  long  and  bitter  strife  of  opposing  parties 
and  conflicting  principles.  The  surroundings  and 
accessories  of  the  theatre  were  open  to  the  charges 
brought  against  them  and  to  the  judgment  which 
the  Puritans  pronounced  upon  them ;  but  it  would 
have  been  an  incalculable  disaster  if  Puritanism 
had  come  into  power  in  time  to  thwart  or  chill  the 
free  and  harmonious  unfolding  of  Shakespeare's 
genius. 

The  evils  which  earnest-minded  Englishmen  saw 
in  the  theatre  were  largely  in  its  surroundings  and 
accessories ;  on  the  stage,  life  was  interpreted  for 
the  most  part  with  consistent  sanity  of  insight  and 
portrayal.  When  the  appalling  vices  which  devas- 
tated the  moral  life  of  Italy  during  the  later  Renais- 
sance are  taken  into  account,  and  the  fascination  of 
Italian  scholarship  and  genius  are  recalled,  it  is  sur- 
prising that  the  English  drama  remained  essentially 
sound  and  wholesome.  The  English  dramatists 
studied  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of  evil,  of  the 
fruit  of  which  the  Italians  had  partaken  with  an 
appetite  sharpened  by  a  long  denial  of  the  ele- 
mental instincts  of  the  body  and  the  mind,  but 
they  refused  to  eat  of  it.  In  Shakespeare's  later 
years  and  after  his  death,  when  the  sky  had  per- 
ceptibly darkened,  the  tragic  genius  of  Webster  and 
Tourneur  seemed  to  turn  instinctively  to  the  crimes 
of  the  Renaissance  rather  than  to  its  vivacity,  variety, 
passionate  interest  in  life,  and  vast  range  of  spirit- 
ual activity ;  and  such1  dramas  as  "  The  Duchess 


APPRENTICESHIP  1 33 

of  Malfi "  and  "  The  Atheist's  Tragedy "  record 
the  effect  on  the  serious  English  mind  of  the 
almost  superhuman  energy  of  the  Renaissance 
when  it  became  an  assertion  of  absolute  individual- 
ism, a  passionate  defiance  of  all  law,  human  or 
divine.  Italy  was  both  the  liberator  ^,nd  the 
teacher  of  modern  Europe ;  in  recovering  the  love 
of  beauty,  the  freedom  of  spirit,  the  large  and  noble 
humanity  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  ideals,  she  ren- 
dered the  modern  world  an  incalculable  service ; 
but  in  the  tremendous  ferment  through  which  she 
passed,  and  the  radical  reaction  against  the  mediae- 
val conceptions  in  which  she  had  lived  for  centuries 
which  followed,  her  moral  life  was  well-nigh  sacri- 
ficed. The  immense  resources  which  she  recov- 
ered for  mankind,  the  splendour  of  her  genius,  the 
range  and  depth  of  human  experience  which  she 
made  her  own,  and  which  she  shared  with  the 
world  in  her  stories  and  dramas,  gave  her  an 
influence  on  the  English  imagination  which  was  not 
diminished  until  long  after  Milton's  time,  and  which 
was  searching  and  almost  overwhelming  when 
Shakespeare  began  to  write.  The  profanity,  the 
cruelty,  the  excesses  of  passion,  the  use  of  crime, 
intrigue,  and  lust  as  dramatic  motives,  which  re- 
pelled and  alarmed  the  Puritans,  were  due  largely 
to  the  influence  and  example  of  the  Italian  drama, 
and  to  the  material  furnished  by  the  Italian  novelle, 
or  tales  of  love  and  intrigue;  but  these  tragic  themes, 
though  often  presented  with  repulsive  frankness, 


134  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

were  almost  always  moralized  in  treatment.  If  the 
crimes  were  appalling,  the  punishments  were  ade- 
quate ;  the  sin  was  not  detached  from  the  penalty 
by  the  subtlety  of  a  corrupt  imagination,  nor  was 
the  deed  separated  from  its  inevitable  consequences 
by  that  dexterity,  so  characteristic  of  the  Italian 
Renaissance,  of  a  mind  marvellously  trained  but 
smitten  with  ethical  blindness.  Compared  with  the 
contemporaneous  Italian  and  French  dramas,  the 
early  English  plays  show  distinct  moral  health ; 
they  are  more  manly,  virile,  and  wholesome.  They 
are  often  coarse ;  they  touch  upon  forbidden  things 
at  times  with  evident  enjoyment ;  they  occasionally 
show  an  inordinate  curiosity  concerning  unnatural 
relations  and  offences ;  but  they  are,  as  a  whole, 
morally  sound  in  the  exact  sense  of  the  words;  and 
when  the  moral  and  intellectual  conditions  under 
which  they  were  produced  and  the  social  influences 
which  surrounded  them  are  taken  into  account,  they 
are  remarkably  clean  and  sane. 

The  English  language,  in  which  strength,  beauty, 
and  compass  of  expression  were  combined,  had 
become  a  well-defined  and  highly  developed  national 
speech  when  Shakespeare  began  to  use  it,  but  was 
still  the  language  of  life  rather  than  of  literature ; 
its  freshest  and  most  beguiling  combinations  of 
sound  and  sense  were  still  to  be  made ;  it  was  still 
warm  from  the  moulds  in  which  it  had  been  cast ;  it 
was  still  plastic  to  the  touch  of  the  imagination. 
The  poet  had  learned  its  most  intimate  familiar 


APPRENTICESHIP 


135 


symbols  of  homely,  domestic,  daily  life  among  the 
people  at  Strat- 
ford ;  he  had 
drunk  of  its 
ancient  classi- 
cal springs  in 
the  grammar 
school;  and,  in 
London,  among 
men  of  gift, 
quality,  and 
knowledge  of 
the  world,  he 
came  quickly  to 
master  the  vo- 
cabulary of  the 
men  of  action, 
adventure,  and 
affairs.  The 
drama  as  a  liter- 
ary form  was  at 
the  same  criti- 
cal stage  ;  it 
was  well  de- 
fined, its  main 
lines  were  dis- 
tinctly marked, 
but  it  had  not 

hardened      into  WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE. 

r  •  i      r  The  J.  Q.  A.  Ward  statue,  which  stands  at  the  entrance  to  the 

Iinal     lOrmS.  Mall,  Central  Park,  New  York. 


136  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

The  genius  of  Marlowe  had  brought  to  its  de- 
velopment the  richness  of  diction  and  the  imagi- 
native splendour  of  great  poetry.  It  remained  for 
Shakespeare  to  harmonize  both  language  and  art 
with  the  highest  individual  insight  and  gift  of  song, 
and  to  blend  in  forms  of  ultimate  beauty  and  power 
the  vitality  of  his  age,  the  quality  of  his  genius,  a 
great  philosophy  of  life,  and  the  freedom  and  flexi- 
bility of  a  language  of  noble  compass  both  of 
thought  and  music. 

The  stage  offered  both  the  form  and  the  field  for 
a  great  popular  literature ;  a  literature  capacious 
enough  to  receive  and  conserve  the  largest  thought 
concerning  human  destiny,  to  disclose  and  to  employ 
the  finest  resources  of  poetry,  and  yet  to  use  a  speech 
which  was  part  of  every  Englishman's  memory  and 
experience.  The  drama  was  the  one  great  oppor- 
tunity of  expression  which  the  age  offered,  and 
Shakespeare  turned  to  it  instinctively.  The  meas- 
ure of  his  genius  was  the  measure  of  his  sensitive- 
ness, and  his  imagination  ran  into  dramatic  channels 
by  the  spiritual  gravitation  of  his  whole  nature. 
It  is  true,  the  drama  was  not  yet  recognized  as  a  form 
of  literature  ;  and  in  this  fortunate  fact  lies  one  of 
the  secrets  of  Shakespeare's  freshness  and  freedom ; 
he  wrote  neither  for  the  critics  of  his  own  time  nor 
for  that  vague  but  inexorable  posterity  which  is  the 
final  judge  of  the  artist's  work.  He  poured  his 
genius,  with  a  sublime  indifference  to  the  verdict  of 
the  future,  into  the  nearest,  the  most  capacious,  and 


APPRENTICESHIP  137 

the  most  vital  forms.  It  is  doubtful  if  he  ever  differ- 
entiated in  his  own  mind  the  different  kinds  of  work 
which  fell  to  his  hand ;  he  was  actor,  manager,  and 
playwright,  after  the  fashion  of  his  time,  without 
literary  self^consciousness  and  without  literary  ambi- 
tions in  the  modern  sense  of  the  word ;  *doing  his 
work  as  if  the  eyes  of  the  whole  world  were  to  read  it, 
but  doing  it  for  the  immediate  reward  of  crowded 
audiences  and  the  satisfaction  of  his  own  artistic  con- 
science. Shakespeare  reached  London  about  1586, 
when  he  was  twenty-two  years  old ;  five  years  later, 
in  1591,  he  was  revising  or  writing  plays;  and  in 
1612  his  work  was  done.  In  about  twenty  years 
he  wrote  the  thirty-six  or  thirty-seven  five-act  plays 
which  bear  his  name ;  "  Venus  and  Adonis,"  "  The 
Rape  of  Lucrece,"  "  A  Lover's  Complaint,"  "  The 
Phoenix  and  Turtle  ";  the  sequence  of  sonnets  which 
of  themselves  would  have  put  him  in  the  front  rank 
of  lyric  poets ;  and  he  made  important  contributions 
to  the  composite  and  surreptitiously  printed  "  The 
Passionate  Pilgrim."  There  is  no  probability  that 
the  date  from  which  the  indentures  of  his  apprentice- 
ship to  the  arts  of  poetry  and  play-writing  ran  will 
ever  be  known ;  it  is  known  that  not  later  than  1591 
his  hand  was  beginning  to  make  itself  felt.  The 
time  was  prodigal  of  great  men  and  great  work. 
Greene,  who  died  the  following  year,  was  starving 
in  a  garret  which  was  in  no  sense  traditional ;  Mar- 
lowe met  his  untimely  death  in  1593;  the  final 
issues  of  Lyly's  "  Euphues  "  were  being  widely  read ; 


138  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

Sidney's  "Arcadia,"  which  had  been  handed  about 
in  manuscript,  after  the  fashion  of  a  time  when 
the  publisher  and  the  reading  public  were  more  than 
a  century  in  the  future,  could  be  read  from  a  well- 
printed  page ;  the  first  books  of  the  "  Faerie  Queene  " 
had  come  out  of  Ireland;  Sidney's  "  Apologie  for 
Poetrie,"  written  in  defence  of  the  stage,  appeared 
in  1595,  eight  years  after  his  death  on  the  bloody 
field  of  Zutphen;  Webb's  "Discourse  of  English 
Poetrie  "  had  come  to  light  in  the  year  of  Shake- 
speare's introduction  to  London,  and  Puttenham's 
"Arte  of  English  Poesie  "  had  followed  it  three  years 
later.  Criticism  did  not  lag  behind  the  beautiful 
lyrical  and  rich  dramatic  productiveness  of  the  age. 
Men  of  action  and  men  of  letters  were  equally  astir, 
and  the  names  of  Spenser  and  Raleigh,  of  Drake 
and  Sidney,  of  Granville  and  Marlowe,  were  heard 
on  all  sides  among  the  men  with  whom  Shakespeare 
lived.  The  Armada  was  fresh  in  the  memory  of  a 
generation  upon  which  a  multitude  of  new  and  stim- 
ulating interests  were  playing ;  life  was  a  vast  fer- 
ment, and  literature  was  on  such  intimate  terms  with 
experience  that  it  became  the  confidant  of  life  and 
the  repository  of  all  its  secrets. 

That  Shakespeare  felt  the  full  force  of  the  intoxi- 
cating vitality  of  the  air  in  which  he  lived  cannot  be 
doubted ;  but  his  first  attempts  at  play-writing  were 
timid  and  tentative.  The  stages  of  the  growth  of 
his  mind  and  art  are  distinctly  marked  in  the  form 
and  substance  of  his  work ;  he  was  in  no  sense  a 


APPRENTICESHIP 


139 


miracle,  in  no  way  an  exception  to  the  universal  law 
of  growth  through  experience,  of  spiritual  ripening 
by  the  process  of  living,  and  of  the  development  of 
skill  through 
apprenticeship. 
He  had  to 
learn  his  trade 
as  every  man 
of  parts  had 
to  learn  it  be- 
fore him,  and 
will  have  to 
learn  it  to  the 
end  of  time. 
His  first  steps 
were  uncer- 
tain ;  they  did 
not  lead  him 
out  of  the 
green  room 
where  the 
stock  of  plays 
was  kept. 
These  plays 
were  drawn 
from  many 
sources  ;  they  were  often  composite  ;  in  many  cases 
individual  authorship  had  been  forgotten,  if  it  had 
ever  been  known ;  no  sense  of  personal  proprietor- 
ship attached  to  them  ;  they  belonged  to  the  theatre ; 


SIR    PHILIP   SIDNEY. 


Engraving  from  the  original  of  Sir  Anthony  More. 


140  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

many  of  them  had  been  revised  so  many  times  by  so 
many  hands  that  all  semblance  of  their  first  forms 
had  disappeared ;  they  were  constantly  changed  by 
the  actors  themselves.  These  plays  were,  in  some 
instances,  not  even  printed ;  they  existed  only  as 
unpublished  manuscripts ;  in  many  cases  a  play  did 
not  exist  as  an  entirety  even  in  manuscript;  it  ex- 
isted only  in  parts  with  cues  for  the  different  actors. 
The  publication  of  a  play  was  the  very  last  thing 
desired  by  the  writer,  or  by  the  theatre  to  which  it 
was  sold  and  to  which  it  belonged,  and  every  pre- 
caution was  taken  to  prevent  a  publicity  which  was 
harmful  to  the  interests  of  author  and  owner.  The 
exclusive  ownership  of  successful  plays  was  a  large 
part  of  the  capital  of  the  theatres.  Shorthand  writ- 
ers often  took  down  the  speeches  of  actors,  and  in 
this  way  plays  were  stolen  and  surreptitiously 
printed  ;  but  they  were  full  of  all  manner  of  inac- 
curacies, the  verse  passages  readily  becoming  prose 
in  the  hands  of  unimaginative  reporters,  and  the 
method  was  regarded  as  dishonourable.  Reputable 
playwrights,  having  sold  a  work  to  a  theatre,  did 
not  regard  it  as  available  for  publication. 

It  is  easy  to  understand,  therefore,  the  uncertainty 
about  the  text  of  many  of  the  Elizabethan  dramas, 
including  that  of  the  Shakespearian  plays.  Having 
sold  a  play,  the  writer,  as  a  rule,  expected  no  further 
gain  from  it,  and  was  chiefly  concerned  to  protect  it 
from  mutilation  by  keeping  it  out  of  print.  For  this 
reason  most  of  the  plays'acted  in  the  reign  of  Eliza- 


APPRENTICESHIP  1 4 1 

beth  and  in  that  of  her  successor  are  lost  beyond 
recovery.  In  order  to  understand  Shakespeare's 
attitude  towards  his  work  it  is  necessary  to  reverse 
contemporary  literary  conditions,  under  which  au- 
thors are  constantly  urged  to  publish  and^the  sense 
of  individual  ownership  in  literary  work  is  intensi- 
fied by  all  the  circumstances  of  the  literary  life. 
Plays  were  sometime  published  in  Shakespeare's 
time  by  the  consent  of  the  theatres  to  which  they 
had  been  sold ;  but  the  privilege  was  rarely  applied 
for.  When  Ben  Jonson  treated  his  plays  as  litera- 
ture by  publishing  them  in  1616  as  his  "Works," 
he  was  ridiculed  for  his  pretensions ;  and  Webster's 
care  to  secure  correctness  in  the  printing  of  his  trage- 
dies laid  him  open  to  a  charge  of  pedantry.  At  a 
later  time  the  popular  interest  in  plays  for  reading 
purposes  opened  an  unsuspected  source  of  income  to 
play-writers,  and  publication  became  customary ;  of 
the  thirty-seven  plays  commonly  credited  to  Shake- 
speare, only  sixteen  were  published  during  the  life  of 
the  poet,  and  these  were  probably  printed  without 
his  authorization,  certainly  without  his  revision. 
There  was  no  copyright  law,  and  the  author  could 
not  protect  himself  against  imperfect  reproduc- 
tions of  his  own  works.  Shakespeare's  income 
came  from  the  sale  of  plays  and  from  the  patron- 
age by  the  public  of  the  theatres  in  which  he 
was  interested ;  from  every  point  of  view  he  was, 
therefore,  averse  to  the  publication  of  his  dramas. 
If  he  had  set  his  heart  on  publicity,  the  theatre 


142  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

was  the  most  effective  form  of  publication  which 
the  times  offered. 

The  prices  paid  for  plays  ranged  from  five  to  ten 
pounds  sterling,  or  from  twenty-five  to  fifty  dollars, 
Ben  Jonson  receiving  the  larger  sum  as  a  minimum. 
These  plays,  having  become  the  absolute  property 
of  the  theatre,  were  treated  with  the  utmost  freedom 
and  were  made  over  from  time  to  time  to  suit  the 
popular  taste ;  they  were  often  the  products  of  col- 
laboration between  two  or  more  authors,  and  the 
feeling  of  the  writer  for  his  work  was  so  slight  that 
many  of  the  plays  appeared  without  a  name. 

In  The  Theatre  or  The  Rose  Shakespeare  found 
a  library  of  such  plays  which  were  the  property,  not 
of  their  writers,  but  of  the  owners  of  the  theatre,  and 
which  were  regarded  not  as  literature  but  as  the 
capital  of  the  company,  to  be  recast,  rewritten,  re- 
vised, and  made  over  to  fit  the  times  and  suit  the 
audience,  which  was  sometimes  to  be  found  at  the 
Palace,  sometimes  in  the  Inns  of  Court,  and  regu- 
larly in  the  rude  wooden  structures  in  which  the 
different  groups  of  players  had  finally  established 
themselves.  These  plays  drew  freely  upon  history, 
tradition,  legend,  and  foreign  romance  and  tale ;  the 
soiled  and  tattered  manuscripts  bore  the  visible 
marks  of  the  handling  of  many  actors  and  prompt- 
ers, and  the  invisible  traces  of  a  multitude  of  histo- 
rians, poets,  romancers,  and  dramatists  whose  work 
had  been  freely  and  frankly  drawn  upon ;  each  suc- 
cessive playwright  using  what  he  needed,  and  dis- 


APPRENTICESHIP  143 

carding  what  seemed  to  him  antiquated  or  ineffective. 
When  Shakespeare  became  familiar  with  this  mass 
of  material,  he  found,  among  other  themes,  the  story 
of  the  fall  of  Troy,  the  death  of  Caesar,  and  various 
incidents  in  the  lives  of  Plutarch's  men,  a  collection 
of  tales  from  Italy  with  the  touch  of  the  Boccaccian 
license  and  gayety  on  them,  stories  of  adventure 
from  Spanish  sources,  dark,  half-legendary  narra- 
tives from  northern  Europe,  and  a  long  list  of  plays 
based  on  English  history  from  the  days  of  Arthur 
to  those  of  Henry  VIII.  and  the  great  Cardinal. 
These  plays  were,  for  the  most  part,  without  order 
or  art ;  they  were  rude  in  structure,  crude  in  form, 
violent  in  expression,  full  of  rant  and  excess  of  feel- 
ing and  action,  crowded  with  incident,  and  blood- 
curdling in  their  realistic  presentation  of  savage 
crime ;  but  there  was  immense  vitality  in  them. 
They  were  the  raw  material  of  literature.  They 
were  as  full  of  colour  and  as  boldly  contemporaneous 
as  a  street  ballad  ;  there  was  enough  history  in  them 
to  make  them  vitally  representative  of  English  life 
and  character ;  but  the  facts  were  handled  with  such 
freedom  as  to  give  the  widest  range  to  the  genius  of 
the  individual  playwright. 

This  was  the  material  which  Shakespeare  found 
ready  to  his  hand  when  he  began  to  feel  the  crea- 
tive impulse  stirring  within  him ;  and  he  used  this 
material  as  his  fellow-craftsmen  used  it.  As  an 
actor  he  knew  these  plays  at  first  hand,  and  with  a 
critical  comprehension  of  their  strong  and  weak 


144  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

points.  He  probably  mended  the  loose  and  defec- 
tive lines  in  his  own  roles ;  all  actors  of  any  origi- 
nality revised  their  lines  freely.  When  he  became 
familiar  with  the  practical  requirements  of  the  stage, 
and  gained  confidence  in  his  own  skill  and  judg- 
ment, he  set  himself  to  working  over  some  of  the 
more  popular  plays  which  were  in  constant  use. 
This  was  his  journey-work,  and  in  doing  it  he 
served  his  apprenticeship.  The  earlier  plays  which 
bear  his  name  are,  for  this  reason,  his  only  in  part. 
They  show  his  touch,  as  yet  largely  untrained,  but 
already  marvellously  sure,  and  with  something  of 
magic  in  it ;  but  they  do  not  disclose  the  higher 
qualities  of  his  genius,  nor  the  large  and  beautiful 
art  which  he  mastered  after  a  few  brief  years  of 
apprenticeship. 

While  it  is  true  that  the  exact  order  in  which 
Shakespeare  wrote  his  plays  is  still  uncertain,  and 
is  likely  to  remain  undetermined,  there  is  very  little 
doubt  regarding  the  general  order  in  which  they 
were  given  to  the  public.  Evidence  both  external 
and  internal  has  at  length  made  possible  a  chronol- 
ogy of  the  plays  which  may  be  accepted  as  conclu- 
sive in  indicating  the  large  lines  of  Shakespeare's 
growth  in  thought  and  art.  The  external  evidence 
is  furnished  by  the  dates  of  the  earliest  publication 
of  some  of  the  plays  in  quarto  editions,  the  entries 
in  the  Register  of  the  Stationers'  Company,  and  the 
references  to  the  plays  in  contemporaneous  books 
and  manuscripts ;  to  these  must  be  added  allusions, 


APPRENTICESHIP  145 

or  supposed  allusions,  in  some  of  the  plays  to  con- 
temporaneous conditions,  events,  and  persons.  The 
internal  evidence  is  derived  from  a  critical  study  of 
Shakespeare's  versification  ;  a  study  which  has  been 
sufficiently  fruitful  to  make  the  application  of  what 
is  known  as  the  metrical  or  verse-test  possible. 

The  blank  verse  in  the  early  plays  conforms  rig- 
idly to  the  rule  which  required  a  pause  at  the  end 
of  each  line ;  in  the  early  verse  rhyming  couplets 
are  in  constant  use.  As  the  poet  gained  confi- 
dence and  skill  he  handled  his  verse  with  increas- 
ing ease  and  freedom,  expanding  metrical  usage, 
varying  the  pause,  discarding  rhyme  and  introduc- 
ing prose ;  and  there  is  an  evident  tendency  to 
exclude  the  verbal  conceits  with  which  the  drama- 
tist entertained  himself  in  his  earlier  work.  The 
growing  habit,  revealed  in  the  later  plays,  of  ending 
a  line  with  a  preposition  or  conjunction  furnishes 
material  for  a  very  minute  and  valuable  study  of 
what  have  become  known  as  "  weak  endings."  All 
these  variations  and  peculiarities  of  style  throw  light 
on  the  chronology  of  the  plays. 

The  first  touches  of  Shakespeare's  hand  are  found 
in  the  first  part  of  "  Henry  VI., "  "  The  Comedy  of 
Errors,"  "  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  "  Love's 
Labor's  Lost,"  and  "  Romeo  and  Juliet."  The  play 
of  "  Titus  Andronicus  "  is  usually  included  among 
the  Shakespearian  dramas,  but  there  is  little  evi- 
dence of  its  Shakespearian  authorship,  and  there 
are  many  reasons  for  doubting  Shakespeare's  con- 


146  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

nection  with  it.  It  was  regarded  as  his  work  by 
some  of  his  contemporaries,  and  included  in  the 
first  complete  edition  of  the  plays  in  1623;  but 
sixty  years  after  his  death,  Edward  Ravenscroft, 
who  edited  the  play  in  1678,  said:  "I  have  been 
told  by  some  anciently  conversant  with  the  stage 
that  it  was  not  originally  his,  but  brought  by  a 
private  author  to  be  acted,  and  he  only  gave  some 
master  touches  to  one  or  two  of  the  principal  parts 
or  characters."  This  tradition  is  probably  in  accord 
with  the  fact ;  the  repulsiveness  of  the  plot,  the 
violence  of  the  tragic  motive,  and  the  absence  of 
humour  from  the  play  are  essentially  foreign  to 
Shakespeare's  art  and  mind.  He  may  have  re- 
touched it  here  and  there ;  he  can  hardly  have  done 
more. 

And  yet  "  Titus  Andronicus,"  with  its  succession 
of  sanguinary  scenes  and  massing  of  moral  atroci- 
ties, may  well  find  a  place  at  the  beginning  of 
Shakespeare's  work,  so  admirably  does  it  illustrate 
the  kind  of  tragedy  which  the  early  Elizabethan 
stage  presented  to  its  auditors.  The  theatre  was 
then  in  what  may  be  called  its  journalistic  stage ; 
it  was  reserved  for  Marlowe  and  Shakespeare  to 
advance  it  to  the  stage  of  literature.  It  was  to  the 
last  degree  sensational  and  sanguinary,  presenting 
feasts  of  horrors  to  the  "  groundlings,"  as  the  worst 
sort  of  sensational  journals  of  to-day  spread  before 
their  readers,  in  crudest  description,  the  details  of 
the  most  repulsive  crimes  and  the  habits  of  the 


APPRENTICESHIP  1 47 

vilest  criminals.  Elizabethan  audiences  delighted 
in  bloody  scenes  and  ranting  declamation,  and  both 
are  still  to  be  found  in  the  sensational  press,  with 
this  difference :  the  early  theatre  reached  relatively 
few  people,  but  the  modern  journal  of  the  worst  sort 
reaches  an  uncounted  multitude.  This  taste  for 
horrors  and  this  exaggeration  of  speech  were  glori- 
fied by  Marlowe's  genius  but  remained  essentially 
unchanged  by  him ;  it  was  left  for  Shakespeare's 
serene  and  balanced  spirit,  deeper  insight,  and 
larger  art  to  discard  the  repulsive  elements  of  the 
tragedy  without  sacrificing  its  power.  In  "  Lear," 
"  Macbeth,"  "  Hamlet,"  and  "  Othello  "  there  are, 
however,  traces  of  the  older  drama.  Shakespeare 
did  not  wholly  escape  the  influence  of  his  time  in 
this  respect.  "  Titus  Andronicus  "  is  not  without 
power,  but  it  is  too  gross  and  redolent  of  the  sham- 
bles even  for  Shakespeare's  most  immature  art ;  if 
he  touched  it  at  all,  it  must  have  been  in  a  purely 
imitative  way,  and  in  the  mere  details  of  expression. 


CHAPTER   VII 

THE   FIRST   FRUITS 

WHETHER  touched  and  strengthened  by  Shake- 
speare or  not,  "  Titus  Andronicus  "  serves  as  a  con- 
necting link  between  the  drama  as  Shakespeare 
found  it  and  his  own  work.  It  is  not  possible  to 
determine  the  exact  order  in  which  the  separate 
plays  in  the  earliest  group  which  record  his  period 
of  apprenticeship  appeared ;  but  of  the  chronology 
of  the  group  as  a  group  there  is  no  doubt.  The 
first  play  which  found  its  way  into  print  appeared 
in  1597,  when  "Romeo  and  Juliet,"  u  Richard  II.," 
and  "  Richard  III."  were  published;  but  it  was  not 
until  the  following  year  that  Shakespeare's  name 
appeared  on  the  title-page  of  a  drama.  As  early 
as  1592,  however,  lines  from  his  hand  had  been 
heard  on  the  stage;  and  he  had  begun  the  work 
of  adaptation  and  revision  still  earlier.  Among  the 
plays  which  Shakespeare  found  in  the  library  of 
The  Theatre,  many  belonged  to  a  class  of  dramas 
dealing  with  subjects  and  scenes  in  history  — 
dramas  which  were  probably  more  popular  with 
the  people  who  sat  in  the  yard  and  in  the  boxes 
than  any  other  plays  which  were  presented  to 
them.  These  plays  appealed  to  the  deepest  in- 

us 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS  149 

stincts  of  men  to  whom  the  defeat  of  the  Armada 
was  a  matter  of  very  recent  history,  and  in  whom 
the  race-consciousness  was  rapidly  developing  into 
a  passionate  conviction  of  the  power  and  greatness 
of  England.  There  was  much  in,  these  plays 
which  appealed  to  the  imagination  as  well  as  to 
that  thirst  of  action  which  was  characteristic  of 
the  time.  They  brought  before  the  eye  and  the 
mind  the  most  commanding  figures  among  the 
earlier  kings  and  king-makers,  and  the  most  ex- 
citing and  dramatic  incidents  in  the  life  of  the 
nation ;  there  was  a  basis  of  fact  ample  enough  to 
give  the  mimic  representations  that  sense  of  reality 
which  the  English  mind  craves,  and  yet  there  was 
scope  for  that  play  of  the  imagination  which  has 
kept  the  English  from  the  rigidity,  hardness,  and 
spiritual  sterility  which  are  the  fruits  of  too  great 
emphasis  on  the  bare  facts  of  history;  there  was 
always  that  touch  of  tragedy  which  invests  a  drama 
with  dignity  and  nobility,  and  yet  there  was  an 
abundance  of  that  humour  which  is  the  necessity 
of  healthy  minds,  because,  by  introducing  the 
normal  contrasts  of  life,  it  maintains  that  external 
balance  which  is  essential  to  spiritual  sanity. 

These  chronicle  plays  were,  moreover,  thor- 
oughly representative  of  English  society;  kings, 
nobles,  statesmen,  ecclesiastics,  and  the  lords  of 
war  were  always  conspicuous  in  the  foreground, 
but  in  the  middle  and  background  there  were  those 
comic  or  semi-comic  figures  in  whose  boastings, 


150  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

blunderings,  wit,  and  coarse  vitality  the  common 
people  took  a  perennial  interest.  These  chronicles, 
crudely  dramatized,  were  a  rich  mine  of  materials 


DROESHOUT   PORTRAIT   OF   WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE. 

for  a  dramatic  genius  of  Shakespeare's  breadth  and 
vitality,  and  they  must  be  placed,  by  force  of  the 
direct  and  indirect  service  they  rendered  him,  with 
the  three  or  four  chief 'streams  of  influence  which 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS  15! 

fed  his  creative  activity.  Their  direct  service  was 
rendered  in  the  material  which  they  furnished  him 
so  abundantly ;  their  indirect  service  was  rendered 
in  the  revelation  of  the  possibilities  for  dramatic 
use  of  historical  records  which  they  made  clear  to 
him,  and  which  sent  him,  with  marvellous  insight, 
to  read  the  pages  of  Holinshed's  "  Chronicles  "  and 
North's  translation  of  Plutarch's  "  Lives."  In  the 
arrangement  of  the  thirty-seven  plays  according 
to  subject-matter  and  treatment,  the  Histories  fill 
a  place  hardly  second  to  the  Tragedies  in  impor- 
tance. The  hold  which  these  old  plays  had  upon 
the  mind  of  the  English  people  was  immensely 
deepened  by  Shakespeare's  large  and  effective 
handling  of  historical  characters  and  situations ; 
and  he  must  be  regarded  as  one  of  the  prime 
forces  in  the  development  of  that  intense  and 
deeply  practical  patriotism  which  knits  the  widely 
scattered  parts  of  the  modern  empire  into  a  vital 
racial  unity. 

It  was  to  this  rich  mass  of  material  that  Shake- 
speare turned  at  the  very  beginning  of  his  career 
as  a  writer  of  plays.  His  vocation  was  probably 
not  yet  clear  to  him;  he  was  groping  his  way 
toward  free  expression,  but  he  did  not  find  it  in 
a  day.  No  man  of  genius  comes  to  complete  self- 
consciousness  save  as  the  result  of  vital  experience 
and  a  good  deal  of  practical  experimenting  with 
such  tools  as  are  at  hand.  Shakespeare  began,  not 
as  a  creator  of  individual  works  of  art,  but  as  an 


152  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

adapter  and  reviser  of  the  work  of  other  men,  or 
as  a  collaborator  with  his  fellow-craftsmen.  There 
have  been  a  number  of  instances  of  conspicuously 
successful  collaboration  among  dramatists ;  in 
Shakespeare's  time,  when  the  end  in  view  was  not 
the  writing  of  a  piece  of  literature,  but  the  mak- 
ing of  a  successful  acting  play,  cooperation  among 
playwrights  was  customary. 

The  three  parts  of  "  Henry  VI."  register  Shake- 
speare's earliest  contact  with  the  material  afforded 
by  the  chronicles,  and  illustrate  both  the  method 
of  using  existing  material  in  vogue  at  the  time  and 
the  results  of  collaboration  on  the  part  of  two  or 
three  contemporary  writers  who  combined  their 
various  gifts  in  order  to  secure  higher  efficiency. 
Malone  came  to  the  conclusion,  after  long  study  of 
this  three-part  play,  that  out  of  6043  lines  1711 
were  written  by  some  author  or  authors  preceding 
Shakespeare,  2373  were  modified  and  changed  by 
him,  and  1899  written  by  his  own  hand.  This 
mathematical  exactness  is  more  impressive  than 
conclusive;  it  has  this  value,  however:  it  brings 
into  clear  view  the  composite  character  of  the 
play,  and  shows  how  Shakespeare  learned  his  art. 
The  poet  was  not  bent  on  creative  work,  but  on 
mastering  the  technical  part  of  play-writing.  Mar- 
lowe, Greene,  and  Peele  have  been  credited  with 
participation  in  the  authorship  of  the  play,  but  the 
passages  assigned  to  them,  and  to  an  earlier  drama- 
tist who  furnished  a  common  foundation  for  these 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS  153 

later  playwrights,  have  been  selected  upon  internal 
evidence  and  rest  upon  conjecture.  Shakespeare's 
connection  with  the  play  is,  fortunately,  beyond 
question ;  whether  he  did  much  or  little  is  of  small 
consequence  so  long  as  we  have  in  the%  play  the 
material  upon  which  he  began  to  work.  The 


THE  TOWER   OF   LONDON,   ABOUT  THE   MIDDLE   OF  THE   SIXTEENTH   CENTURY. 
From  an  old  print. 

sources  of  the  play  are  to  be  found  in   Holinshed's 
«  Chronicles  "  and  Hall's  "  Chronicle." 

The  presentation  of  "  Henry  VI."  in  its  three 
parts  at  the  Rose  Theatre  in  the  spring  of  1592  was 
a  notable  event  in  the  history  of  the  early  London 
stage.  It  was  successful  apparently,  from  the  first 
performance,  and  the  impression  which  it  produced 
on  men  of  intelligence  is  reflected  in  the  words  of 
one  of  Shakespeare's  most  successful  contempora- 
ries :  "  How  it  would  have  joyed  brave  Talbot," 
wrote  Nash :  "  to  thinke  that  after  he  had  lyne  two 


154  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

hundred  yeares  in  his  Tombe  hee  should  triumphe 
againe  on  the  Stage,  and  have  his  bones  newe 
embalmed  with  the  teares  of  ten  thousand  spec- 
tators at  least  (at  severall  times)  who,  in  the 
Tragedian  that  represents  his  person,  imagine  they 
behold  him  fresh  bleeding."  It  is  significant  that 
the  scenes  in  which  Talbot  appears  as  the  leading 
figure  in  the  first  part  are  now  assigned  to  Shake- 
speare by  common  consent.  It  is  as  difficult  to 
doubt  the  hand  of  the  coming  master  in  the  power- 
ful delineation  of  this  great  English  soldier  and  his 
sturdy  son  as  it  is  to  find  that  hand  in  the  cheap 
and  coarse  presentation  of  Joan  of  Arc.  In  the 
most  immature  stage  of  his  development  as  an 
artist  Shakespeare  was  incapable  of  so  vulgar  a 
misreading  of  a  great  career ;  his  insight  would 
have  saved  him  from  so  gross  a  blunder.  In  the 
heroic  figure  of  Talbot  the  typical  Englishman  of 
action,  with  his  superb  energy,  his  dauntless 
courage,  and  his  imperturbable  poise,  appears  for 
the  first  time  on  Shakespeare's  stage  and  predicts  a 
long  line  of  passionate,  daring,  and  effective  leaders. 
The  scene  in  the  Temple  Garden,  where  the  red 
and  white  roses  are  plucked  from  their  fragrant 
seclusion  to  become  the  symbols  of  contending 
factions  on  bloody  fields,  is  unmistakably  Shake- 
spearian ;  and  so  also  are  some  of  the  scenes  in 
which  Jack  Cade  and  his  mob  appear. 

Shakespeare's  part  in  "  Henry  VI."  brought  him 
immediate  recognition.    He  was  twenty-seven  years 


THE   FIRST  FRUITS  155 

old,  and  had  been  in  London  six  years.  His  com- 
petitors remembered  that  a  very  little  time  before 
he  had  been  holding  horses  outside  the  theatres  or 
performing  the  very  humble  duties  of  a  call-boy. 
He  had  come  up  from  Stratford  without  influential 
friends,  a  university  education,  or  technical  training 
for  play-writing,  at  a  time  when  all  the  successful 
dramatists  were  university-bred,  scholars,  wits,  and 
men  whose  social  advantages,  however  lost  or  mis- 
used, had  been  considerable.  A  small  group  of 
these  writers  were  in  possession  of  the  craft  and 
business  of  supplying  the  stage  with  plays.  To 
men  of  the  experience  and  temper  of  Marlowe, 
Greene,  Nash,  Peele,  and  Lodge,  the  sudden  popu- 
lar success  of  a  youth  with  so  little  to  aid  and  so 
much  to  retard  him  in  external  conditions  must 
have  seemed  like  an  intrusion.  They  were  men 
of  loose  lives,  irregular  habits,  and  broken  fortunes. 
Robert  Greene,  the  son  of  a  well-to-do  citi- 
zen of  Norwich,  was  then  in  his  forty-third  year. 
When  he  left  the  university  in  1578,  he  went 
abroad.  "  For  being  at  the  University  of  Cam- 
bridge," he  wrote  toward  the  close  of  his  ill-spent 
life,  "  I  light  among  wags  as  lewd  as  myself,  with 
whom  I  consumed  the  flower  of  my  youth ;  who 
drew  me  to  travel  into  Italy  and  Spain,  in  which 
places  I  saw  and  practised  such  villainy  as  is 
abominable  to  declare."  The  story  of  his  later 
life,  as  told  by  himself,  is  pitiful  in  its  moral 
degradation.  On  his  death-bed  —  friendless,  de- 


156  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

serted,  penniless,  and  consumed  with  remorse  —  he 
wrote  an  appeal  to  his  old  associates,  full  of  bitter-, 
ness,  sound  advice,  and  malice.  "  A  Groats-worth 
of  Wit  bought  with  a  Million  of  Repentance," 
written  in  1592  after  the  striking  success  of  "  Henry 
VI.,"  urges  Marlowe,  Peele,  and  Nash  or  Lodge  to 
give  up  vice,  blasphemy,  and  bitterness  of  speech. 
"  Base-minded  men  all  three  of  you,"  he  writes,  "  if 
by  my  misery  ye  be  not  warned  ;  for  unto  none  of 
you,  like  me,  sought  those  burrs  to  cleave  —  those 
puppets,  I  mean,  that  speak  from  our  mouths,  those 
antics  garnished  in  our  colours.  .  .  .  There  is  an 
upstart  Crow,  beautiful  with  our  feathers,  that  with 
his  Tygers  heart  wrapt  up  in  a  players  hide  sup- 
poses he  is  as  well  able  to  bumbast  out  a  blanke 
verse  as  the  best  of  you ;  and  being  an  absolute 
Johannes  factotum  is,  in  his  own  conceit,  the  only 
shake-scene  in  a  countrie.  O  that  I  might  intreate 
your  rare  wits  to  be  imployed  in  more  profitable 
courses :  and  let  these  Apes  imitate  your  past 
excellence  and  never  more  aquaint  them  with  your 
admired  inventions." 

This  tirade  against  Shakespeare  brings  into 
clear  relief  the  curious  blending  of  remorse  and 
jealousy  which,  even  on  his  death-bed,  was  charac- 
teristic of  Greene.  Having  wasted  great  talents  and 
an  adequate  opportunity,  he  turned,  with  the  hand 
of  death  upon  him,  with  a  malignant  thrust  upon 
the  young  poet  who  was  already  making  friends  by 
the  charm  of  his  temperament,  as  he  was  putting 


THE   FIRST  FRUITS  157 

new  dramatic  value  into  old  and  conventionally 
treated  material  by  sheer  force  of  genius.  Mr. 
Symonds  interprets  this  onslaught  upon  the  rising 
playwright  in  this  fashion  :  "  We,  gentlemen  and 
scholars,  have  founded  the  Drama  in  England,  and 
have  hitherto  held  a  monopoly  of  the  theatres. 
Those  puppets,  antics,  base  grooms,  buckram  gen- 
tlemen, peasants,  painted  monsters  —  for  he  calls 
the  players  by  these  names  in  succession  —  have 
now  learned,  not  only  how  to  act  their  scenes,  but 
how  to  imitate  them,  and  there  is  one  among  them, 
Shakespeare,  who  will  drive  us  all  to  penury." 

The  fight  against  the  new  order  which  Shake- 
speare represented  was  useless,  as  such  fights  always 
are ;  but  Greene  had  very  little  insight  into  the 
nature  of  his  art  and  its  relation  to  the  age,  and  he 
had  already  suffered  one  notable  defeat.  When  he 
came  to  London,  fresh  from  his  university  studies 
and  his  foreign  travel,  plays  written  in  rhyme  held 
the  stage  and  were  the  special  delight  of  theatre- 
goers, and  Greene  soon  developed  marked  skill  and 
facility  in  giving  the  public  precisely  what  it  liked. 
When  he  had  gained  the  public  and  felt  that  the 
stage  was  practically  in  his  hands,  Marlowe  brought 
out  the  tremendous  drama  of  "  Tamburlaine," 
written  in  blank  verse,  and  effected  a  sudden  and 
decisive  revolution  in  public  taste.  Greene  broke 
out  into  violent  abuse  of  dramatists  who  were 
willing  to  stoop  so  low  as  to  use  blank  verse ;  and 
three  years  before  the  appearance  of  "  Henry  VI.," 


158 


WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE 


Nash,  who  had  been  drawn  into  the  fight  by 
Greene,  poured  out  his  contempt  on  the  "  idiot  art- 
masters,  that  intrude  themselves  as  the  alchemists 
of  eloquence,  and  think  to  outbrave  better  pens 

with  the  swell- 
ing bombast  of 
bragging  blank 
verse,  .  .  .  the 
spacious  volu- 
bility of  a  drum- 
ming decasylla- 
bon." 

It  was  not 
long  before 
Greene  was  try- 
ing to  make 
peace  with  the 
public  by  imi- 
tating the  new 
style  which 
Marlowe  had 
brought  into 
vogue.  He 
made  a  truce 
with  the  author 
of  "  Tamburlaine,"  and  the  little  group  of  scholar- 
dramatists  controlled  the  business  of  play-writing. 
At  the  moment  when  their  hold  seemed  most  secure, 
Shakespeare  appeared  as  a  competitor.  As  Greene 
had  fought  Marlowe,  so  he  fought  Shakespeare; 


SIR   FRANCIS   DRAKE. 
From  the  picture  belonging  to  J.  A.  Hope,  Esq. 


THE   FIRST    FRUITS  159 

but  in  the  case  of  Shakespeare  there  must  have 
been  something  more  than  professional  jealousy ; 
men  on  their  death-beds,  as  a  rule,  are  not  con- 
cerned to  protect  from  fresh  competition  a  busi- 
ness in  which  they  have  lost  interest ; ,  they  are 
often  eager,  however,  to  pay  off  a  grudge.  The 
cause  of  Greene's  hatred  is  to  be  found,  probably, 
in  the  perception  of  the  contrast  between  his  wild 
and  wasted  youth  and  the  singular  promise  and 
sanity  of  Shakespeare's  early  career.  There  is 
abundant  evidence  that  there  was  something  win- 
ning in  the  young  poet's  personality,  as  there  was 
something  compelling  in  his  genius.  Men  were 
drawn  to  him  by  the  irresistible  attraction  of  his 
radiant  and  lovable  temperament,  with  its  magical 
range  of  sympathetic  expression.  Penniless,  de- 
serted, and  smitten  with  a  remorse  which  tortured 
without  purifying  him,  Greene  shot  his  last  arrow 
of  malicious  satire  at  the  rising  reputation  of  his 
youngest  competitor,  and  shot  in  vain. 

Henry  Chettle,  who  published  his  rancorous 
attack,  followed  it  in  December,  1592,  three  months 
after  Greene's  death,  with  a  public  apology  which 
contains  a  few  words  of  great  value  as  indicating 
the  feeling  Shakespeare  was  evoking  from  his  fellow- 
workers  :  "  Myself  have  seen  his  demeanour  no  less 
civil  than  he  excellent  in  the  quality  he  professes ; 
besides,  divers  of  worship  have  reported  his  upright- 
ness of  dealing  which  argues  his  honesty,  and  his 
facetious  grace  in  writing  that  approves  his  art." 


160  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

The  sensitive  mind  of  Shakespeare  felt  keenly 
the  dominant  influences  of  his  time,  and  his  earlier 
work  reflects  those  influences.  Brilliant  as  that 
work  is,  it  is  mainly,  with  touches  of  imitation, 
tentative,  registering  the  response  of  the  poet's 
imagination  to  the  different  masters  of  his  art. 
"  Titus  Andronicus,"  if  it  came  from  Shakespeare's 
hand,  betrays  the  influence  of  Marlowe ;  if  this 
sanguinary  drama  is  excluded  from  the  canon  of 
Shakespeare's  dramas,  then  the  reflection  of  Mar- 
lowe's powerful  genius  is  to  be  found  in  "  Richard 
II."  and  "  Richard  III."  These  plays  were  written 
a  little  later  in  time,  but  they  belong  within  the 
first  period  of  the  poet's  creative  activity.  Marlowe 
was  then  at  the  height  of  his  fame  and  popularity, 
and  Shakespeare  could  no  more  have  escaped  the 
spell  of  his  splendid  genius  than  a  sensitive  young 
poet  of  romantic  temper  in  the  decade  between 
1820  and  1830  could  have  escaped  the  influence  of 
Byron.  The  three  parts  of  "  Henry  VI.,"  with  their 
series  of  pictorial  tableaux,  disclose  the  hold  which 
the  chronicle  plays  had  taken  upon  Shakespeare's 
imagination. 

The  comedy  "  Love's  Labour's  Lost"  betrays  the 
influence  of  John  Lyly,  and  of  his  famous  "Euphues, 
the  Anatomy  of  Wit,"  which  appeared  in  London 
about  the  time  Shakespeare  left  the  Grammar  School 
at  Stratford.  The  writer  was  a  young  man  of 
twenty-six  years,  a  member  of  Magdalen  College, 
Oxford,  and  extremely  sensitive  to  the  subtleties 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS  l6l 

and  refinements  of  sentiment  and  language.  His 
talent  was  neither  deep  nor  vital,  but  he  was  one 
of  those  fortunate  men  who  arrive  on  the  scene  at 
the  very  moment  when  their  gifts  receive  the  most 
liberal  reinforcement  from  the  passion,  the%  convic- 
tion, or  the  taste  of  the  hour.  Lyly  had  little  to 
say,  but  he  was  a  sensitive  instrument  ready  to  the 
hand  of  his  time,  and  his  time  made  the  most  of 
him.  He  made  himself  the  fashion  of  the  decade 
by  fastening  as  if  by  instinct  on  its  affectations, 
excesses,  and  eccentricities  of  taste.  The  Renais- 
sance had  made  Europe,  in  intellectual  interests  at 
least,  a  community ;  and  intellectual  impulses  passed 
rapidly  from  one  country  to  another.  By  virtue 
of  her  recovery  of  classical  literature  and  of  her 
creative  energy,  Italy  was  the  leader  of  culture,  the 
exponent  of  the  new  freedom  and  the  higher  taste. 
To  Italy  men  turned  for  the  models  and  standards 
of  literary  art,  as  later  they  turned  to  France  for 
manners  and  dress.  The  Italians  were  still  near 
enough  to  mediaeval  ways  and  habits  to  find  de- 
light in  wiredrawn  definitions,  in  distinctions  so  fine 
that  they  were  almost  invisible,  and  in  allegories 
and  symbolism.  The  schoolmen  were  quibblers  by 
tradition  and  training,  and  quibbling  passed  on 
into  polite  society  when  the  New  Learning  came, 
and  became  the  pastime  and  amusement  of  the 
cultivated  and  fashionable.  Directness  of  speech 
went  out  of  fashion  ;  affectation  of  the  most  extreme 
type  marked  the  man  of  superior  refinement.  Fed- 


162 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


antry,  quibbling,  verbal  juggling,  the  use  of  far- 
fetched similes  and  classical  allusions,  allegories  and 
conceits,  became  the  marks  of  elegance  and  culture. 
England,  Spain,  and  France,  eager  to  emulate  the 
Italians  in  the  newly  opened  field  of  scholarship  and 

art,  fastened,  after 
the  manner  of  imi- 
tators, upon  the 
worst  mannerisms 
of  the  Italians, 
imported  them, 
and  made  them,  if 
possible,  more  arti- 
ficial and  extrava- 
gant. 

In  every  age, 
from  the  time  of 
Surrey  to  that  of 
Pater,  English  lit- 
erature has  shown 
the  presence  of  a 
tendency  to  pre- 
ciosity —  an  over- 
curious  study  of 
words  and  a  skill 
in  using  them  somewhat  too  esoteric.  In  Shake- 
peare's  youth  this  tendency  was  both  a  fashion  and 
a  passion,  and  John  Lyly  was  its  most  successful 
exponent.  He  caught  the  rising  tide,  and  was  car- 
ried to  a  great  height  of  popularity.  "  Euphues  "  was 


SIR   WALTER    RALEIGH. 


Engraving  from  the  original  by  Zucchero. 


THE  FIRST    FRUITS  163 

a  romance  with  a  minimum  of  story  interest  and 
a  maximum  of  reflections  on  love,  manners,  and 
morals,  written  in  a  style  which  was  in  the  last 
degree  ornate,  elaborate,  high-flown,  and  affected. 
There  were  no  libraries  or  newspapers ;  books  were 
few;  the  modern  journal  of  fashion  and  well- 
diluted  romance  had  not  been  born ;  time  hung 
heavily  on  the  hands  of  many  women.  Lyly  knew 
his  audience,  and  wrote  for  it  with  singular  success. 
"  Euphues,"  he  wrote,  "  had  rather  lie  shut  in  a 
lady's  casket  than  open  in  a  scholar's  study."  It 
found  its  way  into  a  prodigious  number  of  such 
caskets.  The  first  part,  originally  published  in 
1579,  was  reprinted  nine  times  in  fifty  years.  The 
word  Euphuism  remains  a  lasting  memorial  of  a 
tendency  which  was  felt  by  nearly  all  the  writers  of 
Shakespeare's  time,  and  which  has  left  traces  in  all 
our  later  literature. 

The  Court  found  in  this  fastidious  and  extrava- 
gant style  a  highly  developed  language  of  homage 
and  flattery,  and  men  of  affairs  used  it  freely  as 
poets.  When  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  was  forty  years 
old  and  Queen  Elizabeth  sixty,  the  brilliant  but 
unfortunate  gentleman  wrote  these  words  from  his 
cell  in  the  Tower  to  Sir  Robert  Cecil :  "  While  she 
was  yet  nigher  at  hand,  that  I  might  hear  of  her 
once  in  two  or  three  days,  my  sorrows  were  the 
less ;  but  even  now  my  heart  is  cast  into  the  depth 
of  all  misery.  I  that  was  wont  to  behold  her  riding 
like  Alexander,  hunting  like  Diana,  walking  like 


1 64  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Venus,  the  gentle  wind  blowing  her  fair  hair  about 
her  pure  cheeks  like  a  nymph ;  sometime  sitting  in 
the  shade  like  a  goddess ;  sometime  singing  like  an 
angel ;  sometime  playing  like  Orpheus.  Behold  the 
sorrow  of  this  world !  Once  amiss,  hath  bereaved 
me  of  all." 

There  was  much  in  Shakespeare's  mind  which 
not  only  made  him  sensitive  to  the  attractions  of 
Euphuism  in  certain  of  its  aspects,  but  stimulated 
the  play  of  his  own  ingenuity.  When  he  gave  free 
rein  to  his  fancy,  no  writer  surpassed  him  in  quips, 
quibbles,  conceits,  puns,  the  use  of  images,  allusions, 
and  comparisons.  He  could  be  as  whimsical,  fan- 
tastic, and  affected  as  the  greatest  literary  fop  of  his 
time,  and  this  not  by  the  way  of  satire  but  for  his 
own  pleasure.  His  earlier  plays  are  often  disfigured 
by  this  vicious  verbal  dexterity;  mere  jugglery 
with  words,  which  has  no  relation  to  art.  "  Love's 
Labour's  Lost"  was  first  published  in  Quarto  form 
in  1598,  with  this  title-page :  "A  Pleasant  Conceited 
Comedy  called  Loues  Labors  Lost."  Shakespeare's 
name  appears  for  the  first  time  on  this  title-page. 
The  play  was  probably  written  several  years  earlier. 
It  was  played  before  the  Queen  during  the  Christ- 
mas festivities  of  1597.  It  is  a  very  characteristic 
piece  of  apprentice  work ;  full  of  prophecy  of  the 
method  of  the  mature  dramatist,  but  full  also  of 
evidences  of  immaturity.  The  young  poet  was  try- 
ing his  hand  at  comedy  for  the  first  time,  and  his 
keen  perception  of  the '  extravagances,  affectations, 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS  165 

and  foibles  of  London  life  had  already  supplied  him 
with  a  fund  of  material  for  satiric  portrayal  of  con- 
temporary manners.  The  wealth  of  vitality  and 
achievement  which  was  characteristic  of  the  age 
ran  to  all  manner  of  excess  and  eccentricity  of 
dress  and  speech.  These  were  the  most  obvious 
aspects  of  the  life  he  saw  about  him  ;  its  deeper 
issues  were  still  beyond  his  experience.  The  quick 
eye  of  the  young  observer  took  in  at  a  glance  the 
brilliance  and  show  of  the  age,  the  dress  of  which 
was  rich  and  elaborate  to  the  last  degree.  "  We 
use  many  more  colours  than  are  in  the  rainbow," 
says  a  contemporary  English  writer;  "all  the  most 
light,  garish,  and  unseemly  colours  that  are  in  the 
world.  .  .  .  We  wear  more  fantastical  fashions 
than  any  nation  under  the  sun  doth,  the  French 
only  excepted." 

The  passion  for  travel  was  general  among  men  of 
fashion,  and  western  Europe  was  laid  under  con- 
tribution for  novelties  in  manners,  dress,  and  speech. 
"  Farewell,  monsieur  traveller,"  writes  Shakespeare ; 
"  look  you  lisp,  and  wear  strange  suits ;  disable  all 
the  benefits  of  your  own  country  ;  be  out  of  love 
with  your  nativity,  and  almost  chide  God  for  mak- 
ing you  that  countenance  you  are,  or  I  will  scarce 
think  you  have  swam  in  a  gondola."  The  language 
of  the  day  was  as  ornate  and  composite  as  the 
dress ;  men  spoke  to  one  another  in  the  most  flow- 
ery speech,  and  the  language  was  strained  to  fur- 
nish compliments  for  women.  The  allusions  to  the 


1 66  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Queen  read  like  fulsome  flattery,  but  women  of 
lesser  rank  received  the  same  homage  of  exagger- 
ated and  high-flown  tribute.  This  splendour  of 
bearing,  often  forced  and  unnatural,  marked  the 
endeavour  of  the  age  to  live  on  a  level  with  the 
greatness  of  life  as  it  was  brought  home  to  the  im- 
agination by  heroic  and  romantic  achievements. 
When  she  had  become  a  wrinkled  old  woman,  the 
Queen  was  discovered  practising  a  new  dance-step 
in  the  solitude  of  her  closet ! 

The  plot  of  "  Love's  Labour's  Lost "  is  slight  and 
of  minor  importance ;  its  sources  have  not  been  dis- 
covered; the  play  lives  in  its  dialogue  and  satire. 
The  influence  of  Lyly  is  apparent  not  only  in  the 
extravagance  and  fastidiousness  of  speech  which 
are  satirized  with  ready  skill,  but  in  the  give  and 
take  of  the  conversation  and  the  quickness  of  rep- 
artee which  first  appeared  in  the  English  drama 
in  Lyly's  court  plays. 

In  this  comedy  of  manners  Shakespeare  makes 
admirable  sport  of  the  high-flown  speech  of  the 
time,  touching  with  a  light  but  sure  hand  its  ambi- 
tious pedantry  in  Holofernes,  the  fantastic  excesses 
of  the  latest  fashion  in  learning  in  Armado,  and  the 
perils  of  Euphuism,  as  he  recognized  them  in  his 
own  art,  in  Biron,  who  probably  speaks  the  poet's 
mind  when  he  puts  by  forever 

Taffeta  phrases,  silken  terms  precise, 
Three-piled  hyperboles,  spruce  affectation, 
Figures  pedantical. 


THE  FIRST   FRUITS  167 

The  youthfulness  of  the  writer  of  the  play  is  shown 
by  the  great  preponderance  of  lines  that  rhyme, 
and  by  its  marked  lyrical  character,  which  stamps  it 
as  the  work  of  a  brilliant  poet  rather  than  of  an 
experienced  dramatist.  Three  sonnets  and  a  song 
are  introduced,  not  because  they  are  necessary  parts 
of  the  drama,  but  because  they  are  the  natural 
forms  of  expression  for  a  young  poet ;  and  Mr. 
Pater  has  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  open- 
ing speech  on  the  immortality  of  fame,  spoken  by 
the  King,  and  the  more  striking  passages  spoken 
by  Biron,  have  "something  of  the  monumental 
style  of  Shakespeare's  Sonnets,  and  are  not  without 
their  conceits  of  thought  and  expression." 

The  stock  figures  with  which  the  stage  was 
familiar  are  prominent  in  the  play ;  the  chief  actors 
are  sketched  with  a  free  hand  rather  than  carefully 
drawn  and  strongly  individualized  after  the  poet's 
later  manner ;  and  the  play  contains  several  charac- 
ters which,  in  the  light  of  later  plays,  are  seen  to 
be  first  studies  of  some  of  the  most  notable  por- 
traits of  riper  years.  The  note  of  youthfulness  is 
distinct  also  in  the  extravagance  of  speech  which 
runs  through  it,  and  which  was  not  only  satirical 
but  full  of  attractiveness  for  the  poet.  Indeed,  the 
comedy  may  be  regarded  as  an  attempt  on  the 
poet's  part  to  free  himself  from  artistic  peril  by 
giving  his  mind,  on  its  dexterous  side,  full  play. 
The  early  ripening  of  artistic  instinct  into  artistic 
knowledge  is  evidenced  by  the  discernment  of  the 


1 68  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

danger  and  the  well-devised  remedy.  Biron  inter- 
prets the  young  poet's  self-consciousness  as  an 
artist  clearly  and  decisively ;  he  shows  us  Shake- 
speare's insight  into  the  methods  and  means  of 
securing  the  freest  expression  of  his  thought,  and 
his  deliberate  selection  of  right  approaches  to  his 
art  and  his  deliberate  rejection  of  the  most  seduc- 
tive errors  of  his  time.  In  this  comedy  his  mind 
was  at  play ;  its  natural  agility,  alertness,  keenness, 
love  of  paradox,  delight  in  the  dexterous  handling 
of  words,  were  allowed  full  scope,  and  the  disease 
of  his  time  came  fully  to  the  surface  and  never 
again  seriously  attacked  him.  With  his  magical 
quickness  of  mental  action  and  command  of  lan- 
guage, he  might  have  succumbed  to  the  temptation 
to  be  a  marvellously  keen  and  adroit  manipulator  of 
words  instead  of  a  great  creative  artist ;  he  might 
easily  have  been  a  fastidious  writer  for  experts  in 
the  bizarre,  the  curious,  and  the  esoteric  in  style, 
instead  of  becoming  the  full-voiced,  large-minded, 
deep-hearted  poet  of  humanity.  This  peril  he 
escaped  by  discerning  it  and,  in  the  very  act  of 
satirizing  it,  giving  his  mind  opportunity  to  indulge 
a  passion  which  all  men  of  artistic  feeling  shared. 
The  play  dealt  more  freely  with  contemporaneous 
events  and  was  more  deeply  embedded  in  contem- 
porary conditions  than  any  other  of  his  dramas; 
for  this  reason  it  became  very  popular  with  Eliza- 
bethan audiences,  but  is  the  least  interesting  of 
Shakespeare's  works  to  modern  readers.  There  is 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS 


169 


in  it  a  preponderance  of  the  local  and  a  minimum 
of  the  universal  elements. 

But  Shakespeare  could  not  satirize  the  extrava- 
gances and  follies  of  his  time  without  suggesting 
the  larger  view  of  life  which  was  always  in  his 
thought;  he  could  not  touch  the  smallest  detail 
of  manners  without  bringing  the  man  into  view. 
In  this  early  and 
sportive  work,  with 
its  incessant  and 
often  metallic  fence 
of  words,  the  young 
poet  disclosed  his 
resolute  grasp  of 
the  realities  of  life 
as  opposed  to  pass- 
ing theories  and 
individual  experi- 
ments. The  arti- 
ficial asceticism  to 
which  the  King 
commits  himself 
and  his  court,  with 
its  fasts,  vigils,  studies,  and  exclusion  of  women,  is  a 
gay  but  futile  attempt  to  interfere  with  normal  hu- 
man emotions,  needs,  and  habits ;  it  breaks  down 
under  the  first  strain  to  which  it  is  subjected,  and  is 
driven  out  of  beclouded  minds  with  the  gayest  of 
womanly  laughter  and  the  keenest  of  womanly  wit. 
The  satire  of  the  play  assails  false  ideas  of  the  place 


THOMAS   NASHE. 
From  an  early  pen  drawing. 


170  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

of  knowledge,  false  uses  of  speech,  and  false  con- 
ceptions of  life ;  it  discloses  the  mind  of  the  poet 
already  at  work  on  the  problem  which  engaged  him 
during  the  whole  of  his  productive  life,  and  in  the 
working  out  of  which  all  the  plays  are  involved : 
the  problem  of  the  right  relation  of  the  individual 
to  the  moral  order,  to  the  family,  and  to  the  State. 
The  breadth  of  view  and  sanity  of  temper  which 
are  at  once  the  most  striking  characteristics  of 
Shakespeare's  mind  and  the  secret  of  the  reality 
and  range  of  his  art  find  in  "  Love's  Labour's  Lost  " 
their  earliest  illustration.  And  in  this  play  are  to 
be  found  also  the  earliest  examples  of  his  free  and 
expressive  character-drawing;  for  Biron  and  Rosa- 
line are  preliminary  studies  for  Benedict  and  Bea- 
trice ;  the  play  of  wit  throughout  the  drama  predicts 
"  Much  Ado  About  Nothing  " ;  the  love-making  of 
Armado  and  Jaquenetta  is  the  earliest  example  of 
a  by-play  of  comedy  which  reaches  perfection  in 
"  As  You  Like  It."  As  a  piece  of  apprentice  work 
"Love's  Labour's  Lost"  is  quite  invaluable;  so 
clearly  does  it  reveal  the  early  processes  of  the 
poet's  mind  and  his  first  selection  of  themes, 
motives,  human  interests,  and  artistic  methods. 

"  The  Comedy  of  Errors  "  belongs  to  this  period 
of  tentative  work,  and  is  interesting  as  showing 
Shakespeare's  familiarity  with  the  traditional  form 
of  comedy  and  as  marking  the  point  of  his  depar- 
ture from  it.  It  was  first  published  in  the  Folio  of 
1623,  but  it  was  presented  as  early  as  the  Christ- 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE. 
The  statue  on  the  Gower  Memorial  at  Stratford-on-Avon. 


172  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

mas  season  of  1594,  in  the  hall  of  Gray's  Inn;  and 
its  production  was  accompanied  by  considerable 
disorder  in  the  audience,  which  must  have  been 
composed  chiefly  of  benchers  and  their  guests. 
This  disturbance  is  mentioned  by  a  chronicler  in 
the  same  year  in  these  words :  "  After  much  sport, 
a  Comedy  of  Errors  was  played  by  the  players ;  so 
that  night  began  and  continued  to  the  end,  in  noth- 
ing but  confusion  and  errors  ;  whereupon  it  was 
ever  afterwards  called  the  'Night  of  Errors.'"  The 
main,  although  not  the  only,  source  of  the  plot  was 
the  Menaschmi  of  Plautus,  in  which  the  Latin  come- 
dian develops  the  almost  unlimited  possibility  of 
blunders  which  lies  in  mistakes  of  identity  —  then 
as  now  a  popular  device  with  playwrights  and  story- 
tellers. Shakespeare  may  have  read  the  comedy  in 
the  original,  or  in  a  translation  by  William  Warner, 
which  was  not  published  until  the  year  following  the 
presentation  of  the  "  Comedy  of  Errors,"  but  which 
was  probably  in  existence  in  manuscript  much  ear- 
lier. In  this  form  many  pieces  of  prose  and  verse 
which  later  became  famous  were  passed  from  hand 
to  hand;  writing  was  practised  chiefly  for  the  pleas- 
ure of  the  writer  and  his  friends,  and  publication  was 
secondary,  and  usually  an  afterthought. 

In  turning  to  Plautus,  Shakespeare  paid  tribute 
to  the  classical  tradition  which  dominated  Italy  and 
was  never  without  witnesses  in  England ;  a  tradi- 
tion which  cannot  be  disregarded  without  serious 
loss  of  artistic  education,  nor  accepted  without 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS  173 

sacrifice  of  original  power.  Whenever  the  classical 
tradition  has  secured  complete  possession  of  the 
stage,  a  new  and  vital  drama  has  been  impossible ; 
whenever  it  has  been  entirely  discarded,  unregu- 
lated individualism  has  degenerated  into  aM  manner 
of  eccentricities  of  plot  and  form.  With  character- 
istic insight,  Shakespeare  escaped  both  dangers ; 
he  knew  the  classical  manner,  and  was  not  unre- 
sponsive to  its  order,  balance,  and  genius  for  pro- 
portion, but  he  refused  to  be  enslaved  or  hampered 
by  it.  English  tragedy  had  secured  complete  free- 
dom, and  was  fast  becoming  the  richest  and  most 
adequate  expression  of  the  English  genius ;  Eng- 
lish comedy  had  been  fighting  the  same  battle,  and 
"  The  Comedy  of  Errors "  marks  the  decisive  tri- 
umph of  the  national  genius.  In  this  play  Shake- 
speare conformed  to  the  ancient  requirements  that 
the  action  should  take  place  in  a  single  day  and 
within  the  limits  of  a  single  locality  —  the  time- 
honoured  unities ;  but  he  changed  the  classical  into 
the  romantic  spirit  by  the  introduction  of  greater 
complexity  of  characters  and  therefore  of  greater 
perplexity  of  plot,  and  by  the  infusion  of  a  vein  of 
pathos  which  is  alien  to  the  Latin  comedy. 

The  ease  with  which  the  difficult  plot  is  handled 
shows  that  Shakespeare  had  already  gone  far  in  his 
education  as  a  playwright.  A  comparison  with 
Plautus's  play  brings  out  his  essential  and  funda- 
mental cleanness  of  imagination.  He  was  a  man  of 
his  time,  and  his  time  was  incredibly  frank  and 


174  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

coarse  of  speech ;  but  whenever  he  could  escape 
into  a  purer  speech  he  rarely  lost  the  opportunity. 
The  coarseness  and  occasional  obscenity  in  his 
work  were  the  dust  of  the  road  along  which  he 
travelled ;  among  the  men  of  his  age  and  voca- 
tion he  was  singularly  refined  in  taste  and  clean 
in  speech.  Moral  sanity  is  one  of  Shakespeare's 
most  characteristic  qualities ;  he  is  ethically  sound 
throughout  the  entire  body  of  his  work.  His 
insight  holds  him  true  at  all  points  to  the  inexora- 
ble play  of  law.  He  offends  the  taste  of  a  more 
fastidious  age,  but  he  is  far  more  wholesome  than 
many  modern  writers  of  irreproachable  vocabulary. 
On  this  whole  matter  Coleridge  has  spoken  the 
final  word :  — 

"  Shakespeare  has  no  innocent  adulteries,  no  inter- 
esting incests,  no  virtuous  vice ;  he  never  renders 
that  amiable  \vhich  religion  and  reason  alike  teach 
us  to  detest,  or  clothes  impurity  in  the  garb  of  vir- 
tue like  Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  the  Kotzebues  of 
the  day.  Shakespeare's  fathers  are  roused  by 
ingratitude,  his  husbands  stung  by  unfaithfulness  ; 
in  him,  in  short,  the  affections  are  wounded  in 
those  points  in  which  all  may,  nay,  must,  feel.  Let 
the  morality  of  Shakespeare  be  contrasted  with  that 
of  the  writers  of  his  own  or  the  succeeding  age,  or 
of  those  of  the  present  day  who  boast  of  their  supe- 
riority in  this  respect.  No  one  can  dispute  that  the 
result  of  such  a  comparison  is  altogether  in  favour  of 
Shakespeare ;  even  the  letters  of  women  of  high 
rank  in  his  age  were  often  coarser  than  his  own  writ- 
ings. If  he  occasionally  disgusts  a  keen  sense  of  deli- 
cacy, he  never  injures  the  mind;  he  neither  excites 


THE   FIRST   FRUITS  175 

nor  flatters  passion,  in  order  to  degrade  the  subject 
of  it ;  he  does  not  use  the  faulty  thing  for  a  faulty  pur- 
pose, nor  carry  on  warfare  against  virtue,  by  caus- 
ing wickedness  to  appear  as  no  wickedness,  through 
the  medium  of  a  morbid  sympathy  with  the  unfor- 
tunate. In  Shakespeare  vice  never  walks  as  in  twi- 
light ;  nothing  is  purposely  out  of  its  place ;  he  in- 
verts not  the  order  of  nature  and  propriety — does 
not  make  every  magistrate  a  drunkard  or  a  glutton, 
nor  every  poor  man  meek,  humane,  and  temperate." 

In  "The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona"  another 
tie  with  the  past  and  another  point  of  departure 
are  discovered.  The  play  seems  to  have  been 
derived  mainly  from  the  Portuguese  novelist  and 
poet  Montemayor,  whose  "  Story  of  the  Shepherd- 
ess Filismena  "  was  well  known  in  English  through 
various  translations  of  the  pastoral  romance  of 
which  it  was  part,  and  is  reminiscent  of  the  plays 
based  chiefly  on  Italian  love-stories  which  were 
popular  before  Shakespeare's  time.  This  comedy 
of  love  and  friendship,  conceived  in  the  romantic 
spirit,  is  slight  and  ineffective  in  construction,  but 
full  of  beauty  in  detail.  It  is  the  work  of  a  poet 
who  was  not  yet  a  dramatist.  There  are  lines  in  it 
which  predict  the  magical  verses  of  the  later  plays ; 
Julia  and  Lucetta  are  hasty,  preliminary  studies  of 
Portia  and  Nerissa;  while  Launce  and  Speed  are  the 
forerunners  of  a  long  succession  of  serving-men 
whose  conceits,  drolleries,  whims,  and  far-fetched 
similes  place  them  among  the  most  original  of  the 
poet's  creations. 


176  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

Shakespeare's  apprentice  work,  even  when  it  was 
limited  to  adaptation  or  recasting  of  existing  mate- 
rials, is  clearly  discriminated  from  his  more  mature 
work  both  by  its  structure  and  its  style :  but  it  is 
tentative  rather  than  imitative,  and  full  of  germs 
which  were  to  find  perfection  of  growth  in  the 
dramas  of  a  later  period. 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE  POETIC  PERIOD 

DURING  the  decade  between  1590  and  1600 
Shakespeare's  productivity  was  continuous,  and 
covered  a  wide  field  of  poetic  expression ;  the  nine- 
teen or  twenty  plays  which  were  written  during 
this  period  included  eight  or  nine  comedies,  one 
tragedy,  and  a  group  of  historical  dramas.  To 
these  must  be  added  the  two  long  lyrical  pieces 
which  bear  his  name,  the  few  short  pieces  incor- 
porated in  "  The  Passionate  Pilgrim,"  "  A  Lover's 
Complaint,"  "  The  Phoenix  and  the  Turtle,"  and 
the  lyrical  poem  on  friendship  and  love  which  took 
the  form  of  a  sequence  of  one  hundred  and  fifty- 
four  sonnets.  The  apprentice  work  of  the  young 
dramatist  may  be  said  to  end  with  the  creation  of 
the  "  Midsummer  Night's  Dream "  and  "  Romeo 
and  Juliet,"  though  in  neither  of  these  beautiful 
dramas  does  his  genius  reach  full  maturity.  At 
the  end  of  six  or  seven  years  after  his  arrival  in 
London  he  had  become  sufficiently  known  and 
successful  to  awaken  envy ;  he  had  tried  various 
dramatic  forms  with  success;  he  had  learned  the 
practical  side  of  play-writing,  and  he  had  gone  a 
long  way  towards  mastering  its  theory;  he  had 

N  I77 


178  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

become  an  actor  of  intelligence,  if  not  of  marked 
gifts ;  and  he  had  established  himself  in  his  pro- 
fession. 

It  must  have  been  a  period  of  deep  and  eager 
spiritual  striving  and  unfolding.  Some  of  the 
poet's  devout  students  in  Germany,  to  whom  his 
fame  owes  much,  and  who  have  enriched  Shake- 
spearian scholarship  for  all  time  with  the  fruits  of 
loving  study  and  of  fruitful  insight,  find  evidence 
that  during  this  time  the  poet  passed  through  a 
storm-and-stress  period.  There  are  many  indica- 
tions, however,  that  this  phase  of  the  dramatist's 
spiritual  life  came  later,  and  was  coincident  with 
tragic  events  which  touched  him  to  the  quick. 
His  earlier  work  shows  a  sunny  nature,  a  sensitive 
mind,  a  gay  and  eager  interest  in  many  forms  of 
experience  and  art. 

If  "  Titus  Andronicus "  was  written  by  Shake- 
speare, and  at  the  beginning  of  his  career,  it  was 
so  purely  external  and  imitative,  so  evidently  out- 
side the  dramatist's  life,  that  it  does  not  count  as  a 
document  in  his  spiritual  history.  The  extraordi- 
nary accuracy  of  description,  the  resolute  and 
unfailing  grasp  of  the  concrete,  which  stamp  the 
very  earliest  work  from  his  hand,  show  him  at  the 
start  more  absorbed  in  seeing  than  in  meditating, 
more  engrossed  by  the  marvellous  spectacle  of  the 
world  than  concerned  with  its  spiritual  order.  It 
is  true,  he  could  not  see  without  thinking,  and 
Shakespeare  was  always  of  a  meditative  temper; 


THE   POETIC  PERIOD 


179 


but  his  first  contact  with  the  world  called  forth  his 
full  power  of  observation,  and  the  emphasis  of  his 
thought  fell,  for  a  time,  outside  his  own  personality. 
As  he  saw  many  sides  of  experience,  so  he  felt 
the  charm  of  various  masters,  and  was  drawn 
toward  Lyly, 
Peele,  and 
Marlowe  ;  he 
came  under 
the  Italian  in- 
fluence, and 
he  was  not  in- 
different to 
classical  mod- 


els and  ima- 
gery. Neither 
in  his  work  nor 
in  his  con- 
sciousness had 
he  come  into 
full  possession 
of  himself. 

The  poet  in 
him  took  prec- 
edence, in  the  order  of  development,  of  the  drama- 
tist ;  and  it  is  as  a  poet  that  his  earliest  artistic  suc- 
cesses were  secured.  From  the  beginning  he  had 
that  freshness  of  feeling  which  is  the  peculiar  and 
characteristic  quality  of  the  artist  of  every  kind ;  he 
had  also  the  sensitive  imagination  and  the  ear  for 


MICHAEL   DRAYTON.      • 
From  an  old  and  rare  pen-drawing. 


l8o  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

melody.  The  world  was  reflected  in  his  mind  as 
in  a  magical  mirror ;  its  large  outlines  and  its  more 
delicate  shadings  lying  clear  and  luminous  before 
him.  But  he  did  not  fully  discern  as  yet  the 
interior  relations  of  spirit  and  form,  the  interde- 
pendence of  individuality  and  the  institutional 
order,  the  reaction  of  the  act  upon  the  actor,  the 
unfolding  of  personality  through  action,  the  inevi- 
table infolding  of  the  tragic  temperament  by  the 
tragic  circumstance,  and  the  final  identification  of 
character  with  destiny.  The  deeper  insights,  the 
creative  grasp  of  the  forces  of  life,  and  the  master- 
ful revelation  of  the  laws  which  govern  them 
through  all  the  processes  of  history,  which  were 
to  make  him  the  first  of  dramatists,  were  growing 
within  him,  but  they  were  not  yet  in  possession  of 
his  spirit  and  his  art ;  he  was  still  primarily  a  poet. 
The  earlier  plays  do  not  reveal  the  evolution  of 
character,  the  action  and  reaction  of  circumstances 
and  forces  within  the  circle  of  movement,  the 
subordination  of  incident  to  action,  and  the  hus- 
banding of  action  in  character,  which  give  the 
dramas  of  his  maturity  their  reality  and  authority. 
The  poet  was  concerned  chiefly  with  the  beauty, 
the  variety,  and  the  humour  of  the  spectacle.  He 
was  full  of  the  charm  of  the  show  of  things  and  of 
pleasure  in  the  action  of  his  own  mind.  He 
delighted  in  rhyme  for  its  own  sake ;  in  classical 
allusions,  not  because,  like  torches  held  in  the  air, 
they  illumine  the  path  of  his  thought,  but  because 


THE   POETIC   PERIOD  l8l 

they  please  his  fancy ;  he  gave  his  mind  license  in 
the  use  of  puns,  conceits,  verbal  dexterities  of  every 
kind ;  he  pushed  wit  to  the  very  limits  of  its 
rational  meaning,  and  sometimes  beyond ;  he 
exhausted  imagery  in  the  endeavour  to'  drain  it 
of  its  suggestiveness  instead  of  leaving  it  to  do  its 
own  work  with  the  imagination.  He  kept  comedy 
and  tragedy  apart,  and  simplified  the  drama  at  the 
expense  of  its  manifold  and  deeper  meaning.  His 
eye  was  marvellously  keen  and  his  hand  magically 
skilful,  but  he  was  not  yet  the  master  of  the 
secrets  of  art  and  life ;  he  was  an  ardent  and 
impressionable  young  poet,  playing  with  the  prob- 
lems of  experience  rather  than  closing  with  them 
in  a  life-and-death  struggle,  presenting  their  lighter 
aspects  externally  rather  than  penetrating  to  their 
heart  and  laying  bare  the  fates  which  sleep  in 
motive  and  passion. 

It  is  easy  to  imagine  the  eager  joy  of  the  young 
playwright  when  he  became  conscious  of  the  pos- 
session of  the  poet's  insight  and  faculty.  In  his 
ardent  imagination  the  great  new  world  of  the 
Renaissance,  with  the  recovery  of  classical  art  in 
one  hemisphere  and  the  discovery  of  America  in 
the  other,  lay  in  all  its  splendour  of  spiritual  and 
material  suggestiveness ;  and  in  this  vast  territory, 
in  which  the  human  spirit  seemed  to  have  acquired 
a  new  freedom  as  well  as  an  enlarged  authority,  he 
came  swiftly  to  feel  at  home.  He  had  the  con- 
sciousness of  great  powers ;  the  sonnets  show  that 


182 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


clearly  enough.  A  member  of  a  profession  which 
was  under  the  ban  not  only  of  institutional  religion 
but  of  society,  and  excluded  from  the  chief  paths  of 
preferment  and  fame,  he  had,  nevertheless,  the 
supreme  joy  of  discovering  the  beauty  of  the  world 
and  the  infinite  variety  of  human  experience  and- 
fate,  and  of  giving  this  manifold  loveliness  and 

moving  show 
of  life  order, 
consistency, 
and  form. 

The  con- 
sciousness of 
the  possession 
of  creative 
power  is  never 
born  in  an 
hour;  it  comes 
like  the  break- 
ing of  the 
day ;  but,  from 
the  first  gleam 
of  light  on  the  horizon,  it  stirs  all  the  sleeping 
forces  of  the  nature,  and  the  adolescence  of  genius 
breeds  an  exaltation,  an  enthusiasm,  a  glow  along 
the  horizons  of  the  future,  born  of  a  sudden  awaken- 
ing of  passion,  imagination,  thought,  and  physical 
energy.  To  the  young  poet  the  world  is  as  full  of 
gods  as  it  was  to  the  myth-makers,  and  light  flashes 
from  it  as  if  the  order  and  splendour  of  the  universe 


EDMUND    SPENSER. 


THE   POETIC   PERIOD  183 

were  being  disclosed  for  the  first  time.  For  adoles- 
cence is  the  individual  and  personal  discovery  of 
life  and  the  world ;  the  young  explorer  is  as  much 
alone  in  his  experience  and  exaltation  of  spirit  as  if 
a  thousand  thousand  earlier  discoverers»had  not 
traversed  the  same  seas  and  made  the  same  journeys 
before  him. 

In  "  Henry  VI."  and  "Titus  Andronicus,"  if  he 
did  more  than  touch  the  latter  play  in  the  most 
perfunctory  way,  Shakespeare  was  doing  purely 
experimental  apprentice  work ;  in  the  "  Comedy  of 
Errors  "  he  indulged  his  exuberant  humour  to  the 
full ;  in  "  Love's  Labour's  Lost "  he  lightly  but 
keenly  satirized  the  foibles  and  extravagances  of  his 
time  in  learning,  speech,  and  style ;  in  "  The  Two 
Gentlemen  of  Verona "  he  made  a  slender  plot 
bear  the  weight  of  his  dawning  imagination  in 
image  and  phrase ;  in  "  Venus  and  Adonis  "  and 
"  The  Rape  of  Lucrece  "  he  surrendered  himself  to 
the  lyric  impulse ;  and  in  the  "  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream  "  and  "  Romeo  and  Juliet "  his  poetic  genius 
rose  to  its  full  height.  In  these  two  dramas,  which 
belong  in  the  front  rank  of  English  poetry,  fancy 
and  imagination  are  seen  in  that  creative  play  with 
the  materials  of  experience  and  of  ideality  which 
fashions  worlds  as  substantial  as  that  on  which  we 
live,  and  yet  touched  with  a  beauty  of  form  and  a 
lucidity  of  meaning  which  we  search  for  in  vain  in 
the  world  of  reality. 

The  stages  of  Shakespeare's  growth  as  a  poet  are 


184  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

as  clearly  marked  as  the  stages  of  his  growth  as  a 
dramatist.  Between  "  Venus  and  Adonis "  and 
"  Romeo  and  Juliet  "  there  intervened  several  years 
of  experience,  observation,  experimentation,  and 
unfolding.  The  freedom  of  movement,  the  fulness 
of  imagination,  the  firm  grasp  of  subject,  and  the 
masterly  handling  of  material  of  all  kinds  which 
are  characteristic  of  the  later  work  did  not  come  at 
call  in  Shakespeare's  case ;  he  was  subject  to  the 
law  of  development  and  dependent  upon  education 
for  the  full  possession  of  himself  and  the  free  use  of 
his  powers.  In  the  earlier  poems  there  are 
passages  of  unsurpassed  beauty,  but  in  construc- 
tion and  style  the  hand  of  the  apprentice  is  mani- 
fest. As  he  had  gone  to  school  to  the  older 
playwrights  when  he  set  about  the  business  of 
writing  plays,  so  he  went  to  school  to  the  older 
poets  when  he  began  to  write  poetry.  The  spell 
of  the  classical  ideal  of  beauty  was  on  all  sensitive 
minds  when  Shakespeare  was  young;  those  who 
emancipated  themselves  from  the  classical  tradition 
of  poetic  and  dramatic  form  did  not  detach  them- 
selves from  the  poetic  conceptions  and  the  beautiful 
world  of  imagery  which  Europe  recovered  in  the 
Renaissance.  The  joy  of  release  from  mediaeval 
rigidity  and  repression  found  its  natural  expression 
in  reverence  for  the  models  and  standards  of  classi- 
cal art.  Man  had  been  born  again  into  conscious 
freedom ;  personality  had  once  more  secured  space 
and  light  for  development ;  to  the  monotony  of  the 


THE   POETIC  PERIOD 


185 


type  in  the  arts  had  succeeded  the  range  and 
variety  of  individuality;  love  of  nature  and  joy  in 
her  presence  had  returned ;  confidence  in  the 
human  spirit  had  been  restored  when  the  shadows 
of  a  world  lying  under  the  ban  of  heaven  »had  been 
banished  ;  an  immense  exhilaration  of  imagination, 
a  great  libera- 
tion of  per- 
sonal force, 
were  the  fruits 
of  the  freedom 
of  mind  and 
soul  which  the 
Renaissance 
secured.  Look- 
ing back  across 
the  Middle 
Ages,  associ- 
ated in  the 
minds  of  the 
men  of  the  new 
time  with  spir- 
itual repres- 
sion and  intel- 
lectual bondage,  the  classical  world  lay  clear,  beauti- 
ful, and  free  in  a  light  that  was  almost  dazzling  after 
the  long  gloom  of  medievalism.  It  is  true  mediaeval- 
ism  had  its  lights,  its  humour,  its  beauty  of  devotion, 
its  deep-rooted  and  noble  art ;  but  the  men  of  the 
Renaissance  were  in  reaction  against  its  repression 


WILLIAM  CECIL,  LORD   BURLEIGH,  PRIME  MINISTER  OF 
QUEEN    ELIZABETH. 

From  the  original  painting  at  Hatfield  House. 


1 86  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

of  natural  instincts,  its  curtailment  of  natural 
activities,  and  they  saw  the  classical  world  in  the 
high  light  of  sharp  contrast.  That  world  is  mar- 
vellously beautiful  to  the  imagination  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  which  constantly  recalls  it  in  every 
art  and  strives  with  passionate  eagerness  to  recover 
its  lost  perfection  of  taste,  of  order,  of  workman- 
ship ;  to  the  imagination  of  the  sixteenth  century 
it  was  the  golden  age  of  the  arts  and  of  the  spirit 
which  fashions  them  —  a  lost  but  immortal  world 
of  freedom,  joy,  beauty,  and  creativeness. 

Shakespeare  had  known  this  older  world  from 
boyhood.  He  was  not  subjugated  by  it,  as  were 
many  of  his  contemporaries,  for  beneath  the  sensi- 
tive surface  of  his  mind  there  was  a  vigorous  and 
self-sustaining  individuality  ;  but  he  felt  its  spell  and 
discerned  its  educational  uses.  He  knew  his  Ovid 
early  enough  to  people  the  Forest  of  Arden  with 
the  older  dreams  of  poetry ;  but  it  was  characteris- 
tic of  his  genius  that  he  did  not  confuse  the  one 
with  the  other.  In  "  Venus  and  Adonis  "  the  great 
passages  are  not  those  which  describe  the  beautiful 
goddess  or  the  shy  and  radiant  youth,  but  those 
which  describe  figures,  landscapes,  and  incidents 
which  he  must  have  seen  or  known  in  the  country 
about  Stratford  in  his  youth. 

His  earliest  poetic  experiments  were  in  the  classi- 
cal vein ;  for  he  knew  the  classical  background  of 
modern  poetry  as  intimately  as  did  Keats.  He 
began  his  poetic  career  under  the  tutelage  of  one  of 


THE   POETIC   PERIOD  187 

the  most  imaginative  of  the  Roman  poets.  In  the 
early  summer  of  1593,  with  the  imprint  of  his  friend 
and  fellow-townsman,  Richard  Field,  on  the  title- 
page,  Shakespeare  made  his  first  appeal  to  the  read- 
ing public  of  his  time,  and  his  first  venture  in  what 
he  and  his  contemporaries  recognized  as  literature. 
He  had  already  made  some  reputation  as  a  play- 
wright ;  but  plays  were  not  then  regarded  as  litera- 
ture. Columbus  died  in  ignorance  that  he  had 
discovered  a  new  world,  so  possessed  was  his  mind 
with  the  conviction  that  he  had  touched  the  out- 
lying islands  of  Asia.  Shakespeare  died  in  igno- 
rance of  the  fact  that  he  had  made  himself  the 
foremost  man  in  literature,  so  far  apart  in  his 
thought  and  the  thought  of  his  time  were  plays 
and  literature.  The  text  of  "  Venus  and  Adonis  " 
was  carefully  read,  and  is  notably  accurate ;  it  was 
printed  under  the  eye  of  the  poet.  The  plays  were 
either  stolen  or  published  in  many  cases  without 
authorization,  and  are,  for  that  reason,  full  of  inac- 
curacies and  difficult  or  questionable  passages. 

It  is  interesting  to  recall  the  fact,  already  re- 
ported, that  four  years  earlier  Richard  Field  had 
brought  out  the  "  Metamorphoses  "  of  Ovid  ;  and 
it  is  also  worth  recalling  that  in  the  year  before  the 
appearance  of  the  "  first  heir "  of  Shakespeare's 
invention  his  father  had  made  an  appraisal  of  the 
goods  of  Field's  father  in  Stratford. 

"  I  know  not  how  I  shall  offend,"  wrote  Shake- 
speare in  the  dedication  of  the  poem  to  the  Earl 


1 88  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

of  Southampton,  "  in  dedicating  my  unpolished 
lines  to  your  Lordship,  nor  how  the  world  will 
censure  me  for  choosing  so  strong  a  prop  to  sup- 
port so  weak  a  burden,  only  if  your  Honour  seem 
but  pleased,  I  account  myself  highly  praised,  and 
vow  to  take  advantage  of  all  idle  hours  till  I  have 
honoured  you  with  some  graver  labour.  But  if  the 
first  heir  of  my  invention  prove  deformed,  I  shall 
be  sorry  it  had  so  noble  a  godfather."  Shake- 
speare was  twenty-nine  years  old,  and  the  Earl  of 
Southampton  was  in  his  twentieth  year — a  young 
man  of  brilliant  parts  and  of  striking  beauty ;  well 
educated ;  with  a  fortune  more  than  adequate  to 
his  rank ;  a  great  favourite  in  the  Court  circle ;  a 
lover  of  literature  and  of  the  drama;  a  generous 
and  appreciative  friend  of  men  of  letters ;  and  a 
representative  man  in  a  great  and  brilliant  period. 
The  two  young  men  had  been  brought  together 
by  those  manifold  affinities  which  in  youth  ripen 
casual  acquaintance  swiftly  into  devoted  friend- 
ship ;  the  glow  of  the  time  was  on  them  both, 
although  the  dawn  of  the  noble  was  to  be  quenched 
in  the  darkness  of  premature  night,  while  that  of 
the  playwright  broadened  into  a  day  which  is  likely 
to  know  no  shadow  of  evening. 

There  has  been  wide  difference  of  opinion  re- 
garding Shakespeare's  meaning  in  describing  the 
poem  as  "  the  first  heir  "  of  his  invention.  It  has 
been  urged  that  the  words  should  be  taken  literally, 
and  that  the  poem  was  probably  composed  at  Strat- 


THE   POETIC   PERIOD  189 

ford  and  carried  to  London,  as  Johnson  carried, 
almost  two  centuries  later,  the  tragedy  of  "  Irene." 
Or  the  poet  may  have  meant  that  it  was  his  first 
attempt  to  write  lyrical  or  narrative  verse.  When 
it  appeared,  no  plays  of  his  had  been  printed ;  the 
plague  was  raging  in  London,  the  theatres  were 
closed,  and  the  poem  may  have  been  composed  at 
this  time.  It  belongs,  in  any  event,  to  his  earliest 
productive  period,  and  is  the  first  fruit  of  his  con- 
scious artistic  life. 

"  Venus  and  Adonis  "  shows  plainly  the  influence 
of  Ovid,  as  do  some  of  the  earlier  plays ;  but  it  is 
free  from  mere  imitation.  Shakespeare  felt  the 
charm  of  the  Latin  poet,  and  reflected  that  charm, 
but  he  used  his  materials  with  freedom  and  individ- 
ual skill.  Ovid  was  followed  only  so  far  as  Shake- 
speare found  it  profitable  to  follow.  The  older 
poet  had  told  the  story  of  the  love  of  Venus  for 
Adonis  when  Cupid's  arrow  pierced  her  by  acci- 
dent ;  how  the  goddess  forsook  all  and  followed 
him ;  how  she  warned  him  against  his  favourite 
pastime  of  hunting  wild  beasts ;  how  she  beguiled 
him  in  shady  places  with  the  tale  of  the  help  she 
gave  Hippomenes  when  he  outran  Atalanta,  and 
then,  as  a  penalty  for  his  ingratitude,  brought  bitter 
misfortune  upon  them ;  how  the  hunted  boar  gave 
Adonis  his  death-wound  ;  how  Venus  brought  the 
anemone  —  the  sensitive  and  delicate  wind-flower 
—  from  his  blood. 

On  the  framework  of  this  classical  tale  the  young 


1 90  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

poet  wrought  his  careful,  well-compacted,  and  thor- 
oughly constructed  poem.  There  is  no  reason  to 
doubt  that  he  had  read  the  story  without  the  aid 
of  a  translation,  although  Golding's  version  ap- 
peared in  his  childhood.  The  story  was  passionate, 
and  the  young  poet  did  nothing  to  disguise  or 
diminish  the  passion ;  on  the  contrary,  he  height- 
ened it  by  setting  the  coldness  of  Adonis  in  sharp 
contrast  with  it.  The  poem  is  too  frankly  passion- 
ate and  too  naked  for  modern  taste ;  since  it  was 
written  Puritan  influence,  by  its  tremendous  em- 
phasis on  righteousness,  has  compelled  us  to  strike 
a  balance  between  the  freedom  of  the  Greek  genius 
and  the  moral  insight  of  the  Hebrew  spirit,  and  the 
problem  of  modern  art  is  to  harmonize  freedom, 
beauty,  and  joy  with  moral  sanity,  order,  and 
power.  The  love  of  beauty  and  the  frank  abandon- 
ment to  its  charms,  which  were  characteristic  of 
the  Renaissance,  are  the  dominant  notes  of  this 
poem  of  a  very  young  poet  who  was  under  the 
spell  of  the  Renaissance  spirit.  It  offends  by  its 
frankness  rather  than  by  its  warmth ;  for  it  is  curi- 
ously cool  and  restrained  in  tone.  It  is  full  of 
striking  lines,  but  the  subject  does  not  seem  to 
inflame  the  poet's  imagination ;  he  works  as  calmly 
as  if  he  were  not  dealing  with  the  most  dangerous 
stuff  in'  the  world.  His  personality  is  as  com- 
pletely hidden  as  in  the  plays ;  the  treatment  is 
wholly  objective.  "  Venus  and  Adonis "  belongs 
to  the  same  period  as  Marlowe's  glowing  version 


THE   POETIC  PERIOD  19! 

of  the  memorable  story  of  "  Hero  and  Leander," 
but  there  could  hardly  be  a  greater  contrast  than 
that  which  is  presented  by  the  two  poems.  In 
Marlowe  the  current  is  deep  and  swift,  and  bears 
one  on  in  a  tumultuous  rush  of  passion ;  in  "  Venus 
and  Adonis  "  the  movement  is  deliberate  and  lei- 
surely, and  the  genius  of  the  poet  is  seen,  not  in  his 


OLD    PALACE,    WHITEHALL. 
From  a  print  engraved  for  Lambert's  "  History  of  London." 

general  treatment,  but  in  the  recurring  pictures  and 
descriptions  with  which  the  poem  abounds.  In  the 
marvellous  exactness  of  his  drawing  the  accuracy 
of  his  observation  is  shown,  and  in  the  mellow 
euphony  of  many  of  its  lines  the  magic  of  his  later 
style  is  predicted.  The  hunted  hare  is  so  true  to 
life  that  he  must  have  been  studied  upon  some 
hill  about  Stratford;  and  all  the  glimpses  of  nature 
are  touches  of  genius.  The  noble  realism  of  the 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

dramatist  is  predicted  again  and  again  in  lines 
which  are  not  only  suffused  with  beauty,  but  cut 
in  outline  as  clearly  as  with  a  graver's  tool. 

"  The  Rape  of  Lucrece  "  appeared  in  the  follow- 
ing year  with  the  imprint  of  Richard  Field,  and 
the  announcement  that  it  was  to  be  sold  at  "the 
sign  of  the  White  Greyhound  in  Paules  Church- 
yard"; a  neighbourhood  which  has  been  haunted  by 
publishers  and  authors  from  that  day  until  the 
last  decade,  when  the  makers  of  books  have  been 
seeking  quarters  in  other  sections  of  London.  Ovid 
was  still  in  the  young  poet's  mind,  although  the 
pathetic  story  of  Lucretia's  fidelity  had  long  been 
familiar  in  prose  and  verse.  "  Lucretia,"  Wharton 
tells  us,  "  was  the  grand  example  of  conjugal  fidelity 
throughout  the  Gothic  ages."  Chaucer  had  set 
her  in  noble  company  in  his  "  Legend  of  Good 
Women,"  and  Sidney  had  recalled  her  in  his 
beautiful  "  Apologie."  Other  English  poets  had 
felt  the  poetic  power  of  the  Roman  matron's  purity, 
and  the  theme  had  not  escaped  the  attention  of 
the  balladists.  The  seven-line  stanza  in  which  the 
poem  is  written  had  been  brought  from  France  by 
Chaucer,  and  its  capacity  for  serious  subjects  had 
been  developed  before  Shakespeare  used  it.  The 
Earl  of  Southampton's  name  appears  on  the  page 
of  dedication,  as  in  the  "  Venus  and  Adonis "  of 
the  previous  year;  but  the  friendship  between  the 
two  men  had  apparently  ripened  in  the  intervening 
months.  The  language  of  dedications  is  rarely  to 


THE   POETIC   PERIOD  193 

be  taken  literally,  and  in  Shakespeare's  time,  as  in 
Johnson's,  it  was  more  notable  for  adulation  than 
for  sincerity;  but,  although  Shakespeare  uses  the 
speech  of  the  courtier  in  addressing  his  friend, 
there  is  a  note  of  sincerity  in  both  dedications. 
The  second  is  more  intimate  and  affectionate  than 
its  predecessor.  "  The  love  I  dedicate  to  your 
Lordship  is  without  end,"  he  writes ;  "...  the 
warrant  I  have  of  your  Honourable  disposition, 
not  the  worth  of  my  untutored  lines,  makes  it 
assured  of  acceptance." 

The  subject  would  have  permitted  the  most  in- 
tense dramatic  feeling,  but,  like  the  story  in  "  Venus 
and  Adonis,"  it  is  presented  not  only  with  entire 
objectivity  but  with  a  certain  coolness  and  aloofness ; 
as  if  the  poet  had  chosen  his  theme  rather  than 
been  chosen  by  it.  His  imagination  was  stimulated 
but  not  possessed  by  it ;  it  is  an  impressive  poetic 
exercise  from  the  hand  of  a  great  poet  rather  than 
an  original  and  characteristic  expression  of  poetic 
genius.  There  are  vivid  impressions,  scenes  that 
stand  out  as  if  cut  with  the  chisel,  striking  reflec- 
tions, and,  at  intervals,  the  inimitable  Shakespearian 
note,  that  magical  harmony  of  sound  and  sense 
that  rings  like  a  bell  in  one's  memory : 

For  Sorrow,  like  a  heavy  hanging  bell, 

Once  set  on  ringing  with  his  own  weight  goes. 

But  the  poet  is  practising,  not  creating;  learning 
his  art,  not  enlarging  it.    It  is  in  detached  passages, 


194  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

not  in  the  completed  work,  that  we  must  look  for 
the  poet  of  "  Romeo  and  Juliet."  In  "  The  Rape 
of  Lucrece  "  there  is,  however,  a  distinct  advance 
in  seriousness  and  dignity;  there  is  not  only  greater 
ease  in  the  use  of  verse,  but  there  is  finer  insight 
and  higher  ideality : 

Who  loves  chaste  life,  there's  Lucrece  for  a  teacher : 

Coleridge  laid  his  finger  on  the  characteristic  quality 
of  "Venus  and  Adonis  "  when  he  pointed  out  the 
fact  that  the  reader  of  the  poem  is  told  nothing; 
he  sees  and  hears  everything.  The  dramatic  element 
was  too  pronounced  in  Shakespeare's  nature,  even 
at  a  time  when  the  poetic  impulse  was  in  the  as- 
cendant, to  permit  of  the  highest  success  in  purely 
narrative  verse;  in  any  event,  he  did  not  stamp 
these  poems  with  that  finality  of  form  which  he 
put  on  many  of  the  plays  and  on  a  large  group  of 
the  sonnets.  The  earliest  pieces  of  his  original 
work  betray  the  immaturity  of  his  genius  and  art; 
they  show  him  under  the  spell  of  the  Renaissance 
spirit ;  they  deal  with  passion  without  being  pas- 
sionate. Their  significance  in  the  history  of  his 
development  has  been  discerned  by  Coleridge  in 
a  passage  memorable  in  Shakespearian  criticism : 

"  The  Venus  and  Adonis  did  not  perhaps  allow 
the  display  of  the  deeper  passions.  But  the  story 
of  Lucretia  seems  to  favour,  and  even  demand,  their 
intensest  workings.  And  yet  we  find  in  Shake- 
speare's management  of  the  tale  neither  pathos  nor 


THE   POETIC  PERIOD  195 

any  other  dramatic  quality.  There  is  the  same 
minute  and  faithful  imagery  as  in  the  former  poem, 
in  the  same  vivid  colours,  inspired  by  the  same 
impetuous  vigour  of  thought,  and  diverging  and 
contracting  with  the  same  activity  of  the  assimila- 
tive and  of  the  modifying  faculties ;  and  with  a  yet 
larger  display,  and  a  wider  range  of  knowledge  and 
reflection :  and  lastly,  with  the  same  perfect  domin- 
ion, often  domination,  over  the  whole  world  of  lan- 
fuage.  What,  then,  shall  we  say  ?  Even  this,  that 
hakespeare,  no  mere  child  of  nature,  no  automaton 
of  genius,  no  passive  vehicle  of  inspiration  possessed 
by  the  spirit,  not  possessing  it,  first  studied  patiently, 
meditated  deeply,  understood  minutely,  till  know- 
ledge, become  habitual  and  intuitive,  wedded  itself 
to  his  habitual  feelings,  and  at  length  gave  birth  to 
that  stupendous  power,  by  which  he  stands  alone, 
with  no  equal  or  second  in  his  own  class  ;  to  that 
power  which  seated  him  on  one  of  the  two  glory- 
smitten  summits  of  the  poetic  mountain,  with  Mil- 
ton as  his  compeer,  not  rival." 

It  is  impossible,  even  in  work  distinctly  sensuous 
in  imagery,  not  to  discern  the  idealist  in  Shake- 
speare. Dealing  with  the  physical  aspects  of  beauty 
in  "  Venus  and  Adonis,"  he  is  bent  on  the  ideal 
beauty.  With  Plato  and  Michael  Angelo,  he  is 
driven  by  the  appearance  of  beauty  to  that  invisible 
and  eternal  reality  which  is  at  once  the  inspiration 
and  justification  of  religion  and  poetry.  In  his 
earliest  thought  the  future  writer  of  the  sonnets 
discerned  the  reality  of  which  all  beautiful  faces, 
aspects,  and  images  are  the  passing  reflections,  the 
fleeting  remembrances  and  prophecies. 


196  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

The  publication  of  these  poems  gave  Shakespeare 
another  constituency  and  a  new  group  of  friends, 
and  brought  him  recognition  and  reputation.  In 
the  eight  years  which  followed  its  appearance  no 
less  than  seven  editions  of  "  Venus  and  Adonis " 
were  issued,  and  "  The  Rape  of  Lucrece"  was  in 
its  fifth  edition  when  the  poet  died.  In  exchanging 
the  writing  of  plays  for  the  writing  of  poems  the 
poet  passed  from  an  occupation  which  shared  to  a 
considerable  extent  the  social  indifference  or  con- 
tempt which  attached  to  the  actor's  profession  to  one 
in  which  gentlemen  were  proud  to  engage.  He 
became,  for  the  time  being,  a  man  of  letters;  he 
thought  of  readers  rather  than  of  hearers ;  he  gave 
his  work  the  care  and  finish  of  intentional  author- 
ship. He  had  become  known  to  the  theatre-going 
people  as  an  actor  of  skill  and  an  adapter  of  plays 
of  uncommon  parts;  he  now  became  known  as  a 
poet.  Writing  four  years  later,  Richard  Barnfield 
comments  on  "  the  honey-flowing  vein  "  of  Shake- 
speare, 

Whose  "  Venus  "  and  whose  "  Lucrece,"  sweet  and  chaste, 
Thy  name  in  fame's  immortal  book  have  plac't ; 

and  in  an  oft-quoted  passage,  which  appeared  in  the 
same  year,  Francis  Meres,  in  his  "Comparative 
Discourse  of  our  English  Poets  with  the  Greek, 
Latin,  and  Italian  Poets,"  uses  these  striking  words, 
expressive  at  once  of  the  impression  which  Shake- 
speare had  made  upon  'his  contemporaries  and  of 


THE   POETIC  PERIOD  197 

his  association  in  their  minds  with  the  Latin  poet 
upon  whom  he  had  drawn  freely  in  both  poems: 
"  As  the  soul  of  Euphorbus  was  thought  to  live  in 
Pythagoras,  so  the  sweet  witty  soul  of  Qvid  lives 
in  mellifluous  and  honey-tongued  Shakespeare; 
witness  his  Venus  and  Adonis,  his  Lucrece,  his  sug- 
ared sonnets  among  his  private  friends.  ..."  A 
year  later  John  Weever  calls  Shakespeare  "honie- 
tongued."  At  Cambridge  in  the  same  year  St.  John's 
College  heard  a  fellow-playwright  declare,  "  I'll  wor- 
ship sweet  Mr.  Shakespeare,  and,  to  honour  him, 
will  lay  his  Venus  and  Adonis  under  my  pillow." 
That  Shakespeare  had  become  so  well  known  that 
the  readers  of  his  poems  and  the  hearers  of  his 
plays  were  divided  on  the  question  of  the  relative 
importance  of  his  works  is  shown,  a  little  later,  by 
these  words  of  Gabriel  Harvey  written,  Mr.  Gollancz 
tells  us,  on  the  fly-leaf  of  a  Chaucer  folio :  "  The 
younger  sort  take  much  delight  in  Shakespeare's 
Venus  and  Adonis  ;  but  his  Lucrece,  and  his  Tragedy 
of  Hamlet,  Prince  of  Denmark,  have  it  in  them  to 
please  the  wiser  sort."  These  references,  and 
others  of  similar  import,  show  the  young  poet  with 
the  earliest  light  of  fame  upon  him.  Life  and  art, 
friends  and  fame,  opportunity  and  work,  were  al- 
ready his.  And  he  had  been  in  London  less  than 
fourteen  years. 

The  poets  of  his  own  time  —  Drayton,  Brooke, 
Weever  —  were  under  the  spell  of  his  genius ;  and 
there  is  good  reason  to  believe  Spenser  was  think- 


198 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


LONDON    IN    1543.      FROM   WESTMINSTER  TO 

ing  of  him  when  he  wrote  in  "  Colin  Cl'outs  come 
home  againe  " : 

And  then,  though  last  not  least  in  Action ; 

A  gentler  shepheard  may  no  where  be  found, 
Whose  muse,  full  of  high  thought's  invention, 

Doth,  like  himselfe,  heroically  sound. 

In  the  Christmas  season  of  1594  he  acted  at 
court  before  Queen  Elizabeth,  and  the  fact  that  his 
plays  were  repeatedly  presented  in  her  presence 
indicates  her  liking  for  his  work  and  her  purpose 
to  show  him  favour.  A  playwright  upon  whose 
words  crowds  hung  in  the  Rose  and  the  Globe; 
whose  great  passages  were  recited  again  and  again 
in  the  palaces  at  Greenwich,  Richmond,  and  White- 
chapel  ;  whose  poems,  having  passed  from  hand  to 
hand  among  his  friends,  appeared  in  rapidly  sue- 


THE   POETIC   PERIOD 


199 


BISHOPSGATE  AND  LEADENHALL.     (See  also  on  the  next  page.) 

ceeding  editions ;  to  whom  many  contemporary 
writers  paid  glowing  tribute ;  and  who  counted 
among  his  friends  some  of  the  most  brilliant  and 
influential  men  of  his  time,  can  hardly  be  regarded 
as  having  escaped  the  notice  of  his  age,  or  as  so 
obscure  as  to  raise  the  question  of  his  authorship 
of  the  work  which  bears  his  name. 

The  lyrical  period  in  the  growth  of  Shakespeare's 
mind  and  art  culminated  about  1597  or  1598,  and 
bore  its  highest  fruits  in  two  dramas  which  hold  a 
place  by  themselves ;  plays  essentially  poetic  in 
quality  and  form,  and  singularly  complete  in  their 
disclosure  of  the  resources  of  his  imagination  and 
his  art.  The  tragic  story  of  Romeo  and  Juliet  had 
attracted  him  at  a  very  early  date ;  there  is  evi- 
dence that  he  was  brooding  over  this  pathetic  tale 


2OO 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


LONDON    IN    1543.       FROM   THE  TOWER  TO   GREENWICH   PALACE. 
This  and  the  two  preceding  illustrations  are  after  an  old  print  in  the  Bodleian  Library. 

in  1591,  although  the  play,  in  the  form  in  which  it 
has  come  down  to  us,  probably  did  not  appear 
before  1596.  It  was  published  in  quarto  form, 
probably  without  the  dramatist's  consent,  in  the  fol- 
lowing year,  and  the  sub-title  declared  that  it  had 
been  publicly  played  often  and  with  great  applause. 
The  poet  found  the  material  for  his  first  tragedy  in 
several  quarters,  and  drew  upon  these  sources  with 
the  freedom  characteristic  of  the  time.  The  story 
has  been  traced  as  far  back  as  the  Greek  romances 
of  the  early  Christian  centuries,  but  long  before 
Shakespeare's  imagination  fastened  upon  it  the 
congenial  soil  of  Italy  had  given  it  new  and  more 
vigorous  life.  The  tragic  fate  of  the  two  lovers 
who  were  destined  to  become  the  typical  lovers  of 


THE   POETIC  PERIOD  2OI 

Western  literature  was  set  forth  at  length  by  Luigi 
da  Porto  in  a  novel  published  about  1535  ;  it  had 
been  sketched  sixty  years  earlier  by  Masuccio,  and 
it  reappeared  in  later  years  in  various  forms;  its 
popularity  and  its  rich  material  tempting  several 
succeeding  story-tellers.  Chief  among  these  was 
Bandello,  who  made  it  the  theme  of  a  novellam  the 
decade  before  Shakespeare's  birth.  Two  years 
before  that  event,  an  English  poet,  Arthur  Brooke, 
told  it  in  English  verse,  and  five  years  later  another 
English  writer,  William  Painter,  gave  a  prose  ver- 
sion of  the  old  story  in  his  "  Palace  of  Pleasure." 
The  main  line  of  development  of  the  tragedy  is  to 
be  found  in  Bandello,  Brooke,  and  Shakespeare ; 
the  dramatist  following  quite  closely  the  plot  as  it 
came  to  him  from  the  English  poet,  but  transform- 
ing and  transfiguring  both  material  and  form  by 
his  insight,  his  dramatic  skill,  and,  above  all,  by 
turning  upon  the  passion  of  love  for  the  first  time 
the  full  splendour  of  his  imagination. 

"Romeo  and  Juliet"  is  the  consummate  flower 
of  Shakespeare's  poetic  genius,  the  complete  dis- 
closure of  his  purely  poetic  gifts.  The  dramatic 
insight  and  skill  with  which  the  materials  are  rear- 
ranged ;  the  brilliancy  of  characterization,  as  in  the 
splendid  figure  of  Mercutio ;  the  rising  tide  of  emo- 
tion which  bears  the  ill-fated  lovers  to  their  death, 
do  not  make  us  blind  to  the  fact  that  this  beautiful 
and  appealing  play,  fragrant  with  the  breath  of  the 
young  summer,  bathed  in  the  soft  radiance  of  the 


202  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Italian  night,  touched  with  the  imperishable  charm 
of  youth  and  passion,  is  primarily  poetic  and  only 
secondarily  dramatic.  The  characteristics  of  the 
early  work  of  the  poet  are  found  in  it :  the  frequent 
use  of  rhymes  and  the  tendency  to  play  with  words ; 
above  all,  the  essentially  lyrical  quality  of  the  play. 
Passages  of  pure  and  unsurpassed  singing  quality 
abound,  and  several  verse-forms  which  were  familiar 
to  the  mediaeval  poets  and  were  in  use  in  Shake- 
speare's time  are  found  in  perfection.  The  first 
meeting  of  the  lovers  in  Capulet's  house  is  described 
in  sonnet  form ;  Juliet's  prayer  in  her  father's 
orchard  for  the  coming  of  night  is  reminiscent  of 
the  Evening-song,  and  has  all  the  qualities  of  the 
Epithalamium ;  while  the  parting  of  the  lovers,  when 

Night's  candles  are  burnt  out,  and  jocund  day 
Stands  tiptoe  on  the  misty  mountain  tops, 

remains  the  most  tender  and  beautiful  Morning- 
song  in  the  language.  Caught  in  the  tragic  move- 
ment of  a  family  feud,  the  lovers  live  out  their 
romance  in  five  passionate  days,  during  which  the 
drama  steadily  deepens  and  sweeps  towards  its  end 
with  tumultuous  current;  and  at  the  supreme 
moment,  with  characteristic  insight,  death  ushers 
in  a  final  peace.  It  is  this  vision  of  reconciliation 
which  made  Shakespeare  a  master  of  human  expe- 
rience in  its  widest  scope  and  significance.  While 
exhibiting  the  fatality  of  individual  struggle  against 
the  social  order,  he  continually  makes  us  aware 


THE   POETIC   PERIOD  203 

of  the  deep  and  radical  changes  which  spring  out 
of  tragic  resistance  and  defiance ;  the  searching 
reaction  of  the  assertion  of  individuality  on  the 
social  order.  * 

Shakespeare's  joy  in  the  possession  of  the  poetic 
gift,  and  his  earliest  delight  in  life,  found  radiant 
expression  in  "  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream,"  a 
masterpiece  of  poetic  fancy,  and  the  gayest  and 
most  beautiful  of  poetic  comedies.  Rich  as  this 
drama  is  in  humorous  effects,  it  is  so  essentially 
lyrical  in  spirit  that  it  stands  alone  in  English 
poetry;  an  exquisite  expansion  of  the  masque  or 
festival  poem  into  a  drama  of  pure  fancy  and  daring 
imagination.  It  was  probably  composed  for  some 
marriage  celebration,  though  it  has  not  been  con- 
nected as  yet  with  any  wedding  among  the  poet's 
friends  or  in  the  court  circle. 

Written  about  1596,  hints  of  the  play  appear  to 
have  been  drawn  from  many  sources.  The  modern 
reader  finds  such  hints  in  Plutarch's  "  Life  of  The- 
seus," in  Chaucer's  "  Knight's  Tale,"  in  Ovid's 
"  Metamorphoses,"  and  in  the  old  French  romance 
of  "  Huon  of  Bordeaux,"  of  which  an  English  trans- 
lation appeared  in  the  decade  between  1530  and 
1540.  Shakespeare's  real  indebtedness,  however,  was 
to  the  poetic  imagination  of  the  Germanic  race  to 
which  he  belonged,  which  still  kept  alive,  in  folk- 
lore and  fairy  tale,  in  every  hamlet  in  England,  the 
magical  world  of  fairy  folk ;  so  near  to  the  world  of 
men,  and  so  intimately  associated  with  that  world, 


204  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

and  yet  invisible  to  all  save  those  who  saw  with  the 
imagination.  Especially  were  these  elusive  elves 
concerned  with  the  mysteries  of  love  and  marriage ; 
and  in  the  magic  mirror  in  which  the  poet  shows 
them  they  not  only  associate  Theseus  and  Hippol- 
yta  with  the  sweetest  traditions  of  English  field 
and  fireside,  but  show  forth,  as  in  a  parable,  the 
magic  properties  of  love  when  love  touches  the 
whole  gamut  of  feeling  and  sets  the  whole  nature 
vibrating  from  the  passions  to  the  imagination. 
There  are  evident  connections  in  the  play  with  the 
aspects  of  life  and  character  which  interested  the 
poet  and  with  which  he  had  already  dealt  in  "  The 
Comedy  of  Errors,"  in  "  Love's  Labour's  Lost,"  and 
in  "  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  while  its 
exquisite  lyrical  quality  affiliates  it  with  "  Romeo 
and  Juliet " ;  but,  both  as  regards  older  sources  of 
incident  and  his  own  earlier  work,  "  A  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream "  stands  in  complete  and  radiant 
individuality.  It  discloses  the  original  and  spon- 
taneous force  of  the  poet's  genius ;  his  ability  to 
use,  fuse,  and  recast  the  most  diverse  materials  with 
entire  freedom  and  yet  with  unerring  artistic  in- 
stinct. He  is  equally  at  home  with  the  classical 
tradition  nobly  presented  in  the  figure  of  Theseus, 
with  the  most  extravagant  rustic  humour  set  in  the 
mouths  of  the  inimitable  clowns,  and  with  the  tra- 
ditional lore  of  childhood  —  the  buoyant  play  of  the 
popular  imagination  —  in  Titania  and  Oberon  and 
Puck.  His  mastery  of  the  verse-form  which  Eng- 


THE   POETIC  PERIOD  205 

lish  tragedy  has  adopted  is  equally  clear  and  strik- 
ing. The  iambic  pentameter,  with  which  his  genius 
has  almost  identified  English  blank  verse,  finds  in 
"  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream  "  the  full  develop- 
ment of  its  melodic  power.  The  line  of  five  feet, 
each  accented  following  an  unaccented  syllable, 
without  rhyme,  is  freed,  in  Shakespeare's  hands, 
from  the  stiffness  and  rigidity  which  characterized 
it  before  Marlowe's  time,  and  becomes  soft  as  a  flute 
in  its  lighter  notes  and  resonant  and  full-toned  as  a 
bell  in  great  passages : 

My  hounds  are  bred  out  of  the  Spartan  kind, 
So  flew'd,  so  sanded ;  and  their  heads  are  hung 
With  ears  that  sweep  away  the  morning  dew ; 
Crook-kneed,  and  dew-lapp'd  like  Thessalian  bulls ; 
Slow  in  pursuit,  but  match'd  in  mouth  like  bells, 
Each  unto  each.     A  cry  more  tuneable 
Was  never  holla'd  to,  nor  cheer'd  with  horn, 
In  Crete,  in  Sparta,  nor  in  Thessaly. 

One  hears  in  these  lines  that  clear  "  chime  of  the 
vowels  "  which  gives  English  verse  its  most  pene- 
trating and  magical  melody. 

The  fairies  and  the  clowns  made  an  irresistible 
appeal  to  the  crowds  in  the  theatre,  and  "  A  Mid- 
summer Night's  Dream  "  enjoyed  almost  a  century 
of  popularity;  it  was  imitated  and  pilfered  from; 
when  it  lost  its  hold  upon  the  generation  of  the 
Restoration,  it  reappeared  as  opera  and  operetta. 
In  Germany  its  fortunes  touched  their  highest  pros- 
perity ;  Wieland  recalled  its  elves  in  his  "  Oberon," 


2O6  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

Goethe  drew  upon  it  in  a  striking  scene  in 
"  Faust,"  and  Mendelssohn,  in  song  and  overture, 
interpreted  it  with  delicate  insight  and  sym- 
pathy. It  is  the  supreme  masterpiece  in  the 
world  of  fairy  lore. 


CHAPTER    IX 

THE   SONNETS 

THE  poetic  period  in  Shakespeare's  development 
coincided  with  a  devotion  to  sonnet-writing  which 
rose  to  the  height  of  a  passion  from  which  few  Eng- 
lish poets  escaped  during  the  closing  decade  of  the 
sixteenth  century.  The  sonnet  was  the  favourite 
verse-form  for  the  expression  of  friendship,  love, 
personal  devotion,  admiration  of  beauty ;  it  engaged 
the  interest  of  the  greatest  poets  and  of  the  most 
mechanical  and  commonplace  verse-makers ;  it  was 
the  chosen  instrument  for  the  most  delicate  and 
poetic  worship  of  individual  women  or  of  abstract 
virtues,  and  for  the  grossest  and  most  obvious 
flattery. 

At  a  time  when  an  author  had  practically  no 
ownership  in  his  own  work  and  when  the  business 
of  publishing  was  carried  on  largely  in  defiance  of 
or  complete  indifference  to  his  wishes,  and  gener- 
ally to  his  harm,  a  great  mass  of  literary  work  was 
circulated  in  manuscript,  and  a  goodly  number  of 
people  found  occupation  in  multiplying  copies  of 
these  unpublished  pieces  for  private  circulation 
among  the  friends  and  admirers  of  authors.  Dur- 

207 


208  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

ing  the  decade  between  1590  and  1600  thousands 
of  sonnets  of  every  degree  of  merit  passed  from 
hand  to  hand,  and  were  read,  known,  and  talked 
about  almost  as  widely,  in  some  cases,  as  printed 
books.  The  reputation  of  certain  groups  of  sonnets 
soon  extended  beyond  the  circle  of  the  writer's 
friends,  and  general  interest  and  curiosity  made  it 
worth  while  for  some  printer  or  publisher  to  secure 
copies  of  the  poems  and  publish  them,  not  only 
without  the  consent  and  revision  of  the  writer,  but 
often  without  his  knowledge. 

This  appears  to  have  been  the  case  with  a  group 
of  sonnets  written  by  Shakespeare  between  1593 
and  1598,  when  the  lyrical  mood  was  dominant. 
The  Sonnets  were  published  in  May,  1609,  by 
Thomas  Thorpe,  who  appears  to  have  turned  the 
absence  of  protection  to  authors  to  his  own  profit 
by  obtaining  and  printing  unpublished  works  which 
had  secured  wide  reading  in  manuscript  form.  The 
popularity  of  Shakespeare's  Sonnets  doubtless 
attracted  his  attention,  and,  having  secured  copies 
of  them,  he  sent  them  to  the  press  without  the 
poet's  consent  and  probably  without  his  knowledge. 
That  many  of  these  poems  had  been  in  existence 
more  than  ten  years  before  the  publication  by 
Thorpe  is  proven  by  the  fact  that  two  of  them 
appeared  in  "  The  Passionate  Pilgrim,"  published 
in  1599,  and  that  Meres,  in  the  "  Palladis  Tamia," 
published  a  year  earlier,  referred  to  Shakespeare's 
"sug'r'd  Sonnets  among 'his  private  friends."  Allu- 


THE   SONNETS  2CX) 

sions  and  lines  in  the  Sonnets  made  it  possible  to 
assign  them  at  least  proximate  dates.  They  can 
hardly  have  been  written  before  1594  nor  later  than 
1598.  They  belong,  therefore,  to  the  period  of 
"  Romeo  and  Juliet "  and  the  "  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream,"  and,  with  "  Venus  and  Adonis  "  and  the 
"  Rape  of  Lucrece,"  which  they  followed  at  a  short 
interval,  they  constitute  Shakespeare's  contribution 
to  lyrical  poetry.  Their  extraordinary  beauty  of 
thought,  sentiment,  and  form  has  given  them  a 
foremost  place  in  English  poetry,  while  their  possi- 
ble significance  as  a  record  of  the  poet's  experience 
or  an  expression  of  his  emotions  has  evoked  an 
immense  body  of  comment. 

Surrey  and  Wyatt  brought  the  sonnet  as  a  liter- 
ary form  from  Italy,  where  Petrarch  was  its  ac- 
knowledged master ;  but  they  did  not  slavishly 
reproduce  the  Petrarchian  model ;  they  followed  a 
sound  instinct  in  giving  the  sonnet  greater  simplic- 
ity. The  Italian  sonnet  consists  of  an  octave  and 
sestet  —  a  group  of  eight  decasyllabic  lines  followed 
by  a  group  of  six  decasyllabic  lines ;  the  sonnet  of 
Shakespeare  consists  of  three  quatrains,  or  groups 
of  four  lines,  with  a  concluding  couplet.  Precisians 
have  held  that  the  Shakespearian  Sonnets  are  not 
sonnets,  but  fourteen-line  poems.  But  Shakespeare 
did  not  originate  the  sonnet-structure  which  he 
used ;  it  had  been  made  ready  to  his  hand  by  a  long 
line  of  English  poets.  His  supreme  skill  gave  final 
authority  to  what  had  hitherto  been  an  experiment. 


210  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Fifty-two  years  before  the  publication  of  Shake- 
speare's Sonnets,  a  group  of  sonnets  by  Surrey  and 
another  group  by  Wyatt  had  been  published,  many 
of  them  being  translations  from  Petrarch.  The  vol- 
ume containing  these  sonnets  was  reprinted  six  or 
seven  times  before  Shakespeare  left  Stratford.  It 
was  followed  in  1582  by  Watson's  "  Centurie  of 
Love";  in  1591  by  Sidney's  "Astrophel  and 
Stella";  in  1592  by  Daniel's  "Delia"  and  Consta- 
ble's "Diana";  in  1593  by  Fletcher's  "  Licia," 
Barnes's  "  Parthenophil,"  and  Lodge's  "Phillis"; 
in  1594  by  Spenser's  "Amoretti"  and  Drayton's 
"  Idea."  To  these  collections  of  sonnets  must  be 
added  probably  as  many  more,  the  impulse  expend- 
ing itself  apparently  about  1597.  The  culminating 
point  of  this  passion  for  sonnet-writing  was  probably 
reached  about  1594,  and  its  highest  point  of  achieve- 
ment was  attained  by  Shakespeare.  While  there  is 
much  that  is  interesting  and  even  important,  from 
the  standpoint  not  only  of  literary  development  but 
artistic  excellence,  in  the  work  of  this  large  group 
of  sonneteers,  Shakespeare  alone  gave  his  work 
universal  significance  and  original  and  enduring 
beauty. 

He  did  not  originate  a  new  form  of  sonnet,  as  he 
did  not  originate  a  new  form  of  drama ;  he  took  the 
form  which  he  found  ready  to  his  hand  and  gave  it 
freedom,  flexibility,  a  new  compass,  and  a  capacity 
for  musical  expression  which  the  earlier  English 
poets  had  predicted  but  had  not  unfolded.  He  con- 


THE   SONNETS  211 

tinued  and  completed  the  modification  of  the  sonnet 
as  Petrarch  left  it  which  had  been  effected  by  the 
English  sonneteers  since  the  time  of  Surrey  and 
Wyatt;  surrendering  something  of  the 'sustained 
fulness  of  tone  of  the  Italian  sonnet,  but  securing 
a  sweetness,  a  flow  of  pure  melody,  which  were  be- 
yond the  compass  of  the  earlier  English  sonneteers. 
The  decasyllabic  lines  in  groups  of  four,  the  alternate 
lines  rhyming,  and  closing  with  a  couplet,  imposed 
rigid  limitations  on  the  poet  but  did  not  prevent 
him  from  securing  some  noble  melodic  effects. 

The  one  hundred  and  fifty-four  poems  which 
make  up  the  "  Book  Called  Shakespeare's  Son- 
nettes "  form  a  sonnet-sequence,  as  clearly  as  do 
Mrs.  Browning's  "  Sonnets  from  the  Portuguese,"  or 
Dante  Gabriel  Rossetti's  "House  of  Life";  they 
deal  with  two  leading  themes  in  an  order  which  is 
not  necessarily  historical,  but  which  discloses  an 
interior  principle  of  arrangement ;  to  borrow  a  com- 
parison from  music,  they  consist  of  variations  on 
two  dominating  motives  or  themes.  The  order  in 
which  they  were  presented  in  the  edition  of  1609 
has  been  generally  accepted,  although  nothing  is 
known  with  regard  to  the  principle  or  method  of 
arrangement  followed  by  the  publisher.  This  order 
has  been  accepted  because  it  has,  in  the  judgment 
of  a  majority  of  students,  the  justification  of  a  logi- 
cal and  intelligible  grouping.  In  the  poet's  time, 
sonnets  were  often  written  in  sequence ;  the  sepa- 
rate poems  presenting,  when  read  as  a  whole,  a 


212  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

many-sided  but  connected  treatment  of  a  single 
theme  or  of  a  group  of  relating  themes.  The  sepa- 
rate sonnets,  written  from  time  to  time  as  expres- 
sions of  diverse  moods,  as  Tennyson  wrote  "  In 
Memoriam,"  disclosed,  when  brought  together,  a 
unity,  not  only  of  manner,  but  of  theme  or  thought. 
There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  Shakespeare 
wrote  the  Sonnets  at  intervals  during  a  period  of 
four  or  five  years ;  the  Sonnets  show  that  during 
this  period  his  mind  was  constantly  reverting  to  two 
kinds  of  emotional  experience,  which  he  approached 
from  many  different  points  of  view  and  in  many 
diverse  moods,  but  which  held  a  first  place  in  his 
interest  and  moved  him  to  expression. 

The  one  hundred  and  fifty-four  poems  in  Shake- 
speare's sonnet-sequence  have  for  their  general 
themes  a  deep  and  highly  idealized  love  or  friendship 
for  a  young  man  of  extraordinary  beauty  and  charm 
of  nature,  and  a  passionate  love  for  a  "  dark  woman." 
These  two  unknown  persons  and  the  poet  are 
the  actors  in  a  drama  which  may  have  been  subjec- 
tive in  its  origin,  but  which  is  definitely  objective  in 
its  presentation.  The  spiritual  motive  is  suggested 
in  the  one  hundred  and  forty-fourth  sonnet: 

Two  loves  I  have  of  comfort  and  despair, 
Which  like  two  spirits  do  suggest  me  still ; 

The  better  angel  is  a  man  right  fair, 
The  worser  spirit  a  woman  colour'd  ill. 

The  friend  to  whom  the  first  one  hundred  and 
twenty-six  sonnets  are  addressed  was  noble  in  na- 


THE   SONNETS 


213 


ture,  station,  and  fortune,  endowed  with  all  manly 
qualities,  and  possessed  of  a  winning  beauty  of  fea- 
ture and  charm  of  manner ;  the  remaining  twenty- 
eight  are  ad- 
dressed to  or 
describe  rela- 
tions with  a 
woman  who 
was  plain  of 
feature,  pale, 
dark,  treach- 
e  ro  us,  and 
stained,  but 
the  mistress  of 
a  potent  fasci- 
nation. If  the 
sonnets  are 
read  in  their 
present  order 
as  forming 

a        ronnertpH         WILLIAM  HERBERT,  EARL  OF  PEMBROKE,  SHAKE- 
SPEARE'S FRIEND  AND  PATRON. 

poem,  the  pOet,  From  an  engraving  by  T.  Jenkins,  after  the  original  of  Van 

1    •       r    •         _i  i  Dyke,  in  the  collection  of  the  Earl  of  Pembroke. 

the  dark  woman  enact  a  drama  of  love,  the  acts  of 
which  are  recorded  in  the  emotions  and  meditations 
of  the  poet.  The  entire  sequence  may  be  broken 
into  smaller  groups,  each  of  which  conveys  with 
more  or  less  definiteness  and  completeness  some 
phase  of  the  drama  or  some  aspect  of  the  poet's 
experience. 


214  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

The  sonnet-sequence  opens  with  a  celebration  of 
the  beauty  and  perfections  of  the  noble  youth  whom 
the  poet  loves,  dwelling  with  an  idealizing  delicacy 
and  subtlety,  after  the  manner  of  the  Elizabethan 
sonneteer,  on  his  separate  and  numerable  charms, 
and  urging  him  to  marry  in  order  that  the  marvel- 
lous beauty  which  has  been  given  him  may  be  repro- 
duced in  his  children.  Failing  to  secure  for  posterity 
copies  of  his  friend's  beauty  by  marriage,  the  poet 
offers  to  give  it  immortality  in  his  verse.  With  the 
twenty-seventh  sonnet  a  note  of  sadness  and  pain, 
foreshadowing  a  change  in  the  harmony  between  the 
poet  and  his  friend,  is  sounded ;  and  the  thoughts 
which  come  in  absence  and  separation  rise  in  the 
poet's  mind  and  are  set  in  exquisite  form  before  the 
imagination  in  "sessions  of  sweet  silent  thought." 
The  modulations  of  this  theme  are  marvellously 
varied  and  beautiful,  covering  the  whole  range  of 
sadness,  longing,  regret,  loneliness,  misgiving,  fore- 
boding, and  despair. 

So  far  no  shadow  save  that  of  separation  has 
rested  upon  the  friendship  between  the  two  men, 
but  now  the  dark  woman  enters.  The  poet  in  the 
forty-second  sonnet  describes  himself  as  her  lover, 
and  his  sorrow  gets  its  deepest  pang  from  the  fact 
that  his  friend  has. robbed  him  of  his  mistress: 

If  I  lose  thee,  my  loss  is  my  love's  gain, 

And  losing  her,  my  friend  hath  found  that  loss ; 

Both  find  each  other,  and  I  lose  both  twain 
And  both  for  my  sake  lay  on  me  this  cross : 


THE   SONNETS  215 

But  here's  the  joy  :  my  friend  and  I  are  one ; 
Sweet  flattery  !  then  she  loves  but  me  alone. 

Loneliness,  disillusion,  pain,  self-denial,  renuncia- 
tion, and  forgiveness  are  the  notes  of  this  phase  of 
the  poet's  experience,  rationalized  and  illuminated  by 
meditation.  There  is  no  bitterness  in  his  thought 
of  his  friend,  estranged  from  him  by  the  woman  he 
loves  and  thus  bringing  him  a  double  loss ;  his  love 
and  admiration  triumph  over  his  sense  of  injustice 
and  injury.  This  feeling  gives  the  episode  of  shat- 
tered friendship  its  tenderest  note,  and  has  left  its 
record  in  a  sonnet  which  registers  Shakespeare's 
highest  achievement  in  the  field  of  lyric  poetry : 

That  time  of  year  thou  mayst  in  me  behold 

When  yellow  leaves,  or  none,  or  few,  do  hang 
Upon  those  boughs  which  shake  against  the  cold 

Bare  ruin'd  choirs,  where  late  the  sweet  birds  sang. 
In  me  thou  seest  the  twilight  of  such  day 

As  after  sunset  fadeth  in  the  west ; 
Which  by  and  by  black  night  doth  take  away, 

Death's  second  self,  that  seals  up  all  in  rest. 
In  me  thou  seest  the  glowing  of  such  fire, 

That  on  the  ashes  of  his  youth  doth  lie, 
As  the  death-bed  whereon  it  must  expire, 

Consumed  with  that  which  it  was  nourish'd  by. 
This  thou  perceivest,  which  makes  thy  love  more  strong, 
To  love  that  well  which  thou  must  leave  ere  long. 

In  the  forty-eighth  sonnet  the  entrance  of  a  rival 
poet  is  recorded,  and.  the  charms  which  have  hith- 
erto been  celebrated  by  the  writer  of  the  Sonnets 
inspire  "  the  travail  of  a  mightier  pen."  The  rival 
singer,  whose  advent  gives  a  wound  to  the  son- 


2l6  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

neteer's  self-love,  has  been  identified  by  different 
students  of  the  Sonnets  with  Chapman,  Marlowe, 
Drayton,  and  Daniel.  In  the  light  of  rejection  and 
disillusion  the  poet  comments  with  unflinching 
frankness  on  the  meanness  of  the  player's  occupa- 
tion, the  lowliness  of  his  own  station  in  life,  and  the 
frequent  supremacy  of  evil  in  the  world.  Through 
all  these  phases  of  his  humiliation  and  sorrow  his 
love  for  his  friend  remains  unmoved,  and  he  finds  a 
deep  consolation  in  the  sense  of  power  which  his 
art  gives  him.  Through  art  the  beauty  of  his 
friend  shall  be  the  joy  of  posterity,  as  it  has  been 
the  poet's  inspiration. 

There  is  a  touching  cry  of  farewell  in  the  eighty- 
seventh  sonnet ;  but  after  an  interval  of  silence  the 
poet  takes  up  again  the  old  themes,  with  more  as- 
surance and  with  a  new  note  of  hope  and  faith. 
This  note  becomes  dominant  in  the  one  hundred 
and  sixteenth  sonnet,  which  may  be  regarded  as  the 
highest  point  of  vision  attained  in  the  sequence : 

Let  me  not  to  the  marriage  of  true  minds 

Admit  impediments.     Love  is  not  love 
Which  alters  when  it  alteration  finds, 

Or  bends  with  the  remover  to  remove : 
Oh,  no  !  it  is  an  ever-fixed  mark, 

That  looks  on  tempests  and  is  never  shaken ; 
It  is  the  star  to  every  wandering  bark, 

Whose  worth's  unknown,  although  his  height  be  taken. 
Love's  not  Time's  fool,  though  rosy  lips  and  cheeks 

Within  his  bending  sickle's  compass  come ; 
Love  alters  not  with  his  brief  hours  and  weeks, 

But  bears  it  out  even  to  the  edge  of  doom. 


THE  SONNETS  21  ^ 

If  this  be  error  and  upon  me  proved, 
I  never  writ,  nor  no  man  ever  loved. 

Of  the  second  general  group  of  the  Sonnets, 
beginning  with  the  one  hundred  and  twenty-sev- 
enth, seventeen  are  addressed  to  the  woman  whose 
dark  fascinations  have  woven  a  spell  over  the  poet's 
senses  without  beguiling  his  intellect,  and  have 
estranged  his  friend ;  while  of  the  remaining  eleven 
sonnets,  nine  are  given  up,  for  the  most  part,  to 
the  regret,  repentance,  and  humiliation  which  his 
fatuous  passion  has  brought  to  him.  There  is 
neither  evasion  nor  self-deception  in  these  striking 
confessions ;  they  are  charged  with  the  bitterness 
of  sincere  and  unflinching  self-discovery  and  self- 
revelation  : 

What  potions  have  I  drunk  of  Siren  tears, 
DistilPd  from  limbecks  foul  as  hell  within, 

Applying  fears  to  hopes  and  hopes  to  fears, 
Still  losing  when  I  saw  myself  to  win  ! 

The  two  concluding  sonnets  serve  as  a  postlude 
to  the  group,  and  at  the  very  end  of  the  sequence 
touch  with  the  glow  and  heat  of  "  love's  fire  "  the 
long  story  of  the  poem. 

For  many  years  the  Sonnets  shared  the  general 
indifference  to  Shakespeare  which,  perhaps  as  dis- 
tinctly as  any  other  sign  of  the  times,  measured  the 
distance  in  taste  and  feeling  between  the  age  of 
Elizabeth  and  that  of  Queen  Anne  and  her  imme- 
diate successors.  During  the  century  now  closing 
no  part  of  Shakespeare's  work  has  been  more 


2l8  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

patiently  or  eagerly  studied,  and  concerning  none 
has  there  been  greater  divergence  of  opinion. 

It  has  been  held  by  some  students  that  the  Son- 
nets are  to  be  regarded  chiefly  as  poetic  exercises, 
and  Mr.  Sidney  Lee  has  not  only  reenforced  this 
view,  but  made  a  substantial  contribution  to  liter- 
ary scholarship  by  a  thorough  examination  of  the 
attitude  and  methods  of  English  sonneteers  in  Shake- 
speare's time  and  of  sonnet-writing  on  the  Conti- 
nent. Whatever  interpretation  is  put  upon  the 
Sonnets,  the  background  of  poetic  habit  and  con- 
vention which  Mr.  Lee  has  put  behind  sonnet-writ- 
;ng  at  the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century  must  be 
raken  into  account ;  for  Shakespeare  was  preemi- 
nently an  opportunist  so  far  as  the  use  of  materials 
and  methods  were  concerned ;  with  his  poetic  sensi- 
tiveness and  thrift  in  invention  he  could  not  have 
failed  to  share  the  passion  for  sonnet-writing  and 
the  conventional  attitude  toward  the  art  as  a  highly 
specialized  form  of  lyric  poetry. 

This  means  that  it  would  have  been  a  natural 
exercise  of  Shakespeare's  poetic  faculty  to  idealize 
a  patron ;  to  give  to  a  friendship  for  a  man  of  great 
station  the  warmth  and  emotion  of  a  deep  personal 
love ;  to  comment  upon  the  frailty  of  women,  the 
treachery  of  friends,  and  the  hardness  of  the  world 
as  if  these  things  had  come  within  the  compass  of 
the  poet's  experience ;  to  address  elaborate  apostro- 
phes to  abstract  virtues;  to  make  an  imaginary 
woman  the  object  of  a  >  passion  and  the  shaping 


THE   SONNETS  219 

spirit  of  an  intrigue  which  should  have  the  sem- 
blance of  reality  without  having  any  more  sub- 
stantial basis  than  the  fancy  of  an  Elizabethan 
sonneteer. 

This  is  what  Shakespeare  may  have  done  ;  but  it 
is  highly  improbable  that  the  key  to  the  Sonnets  is 
to  be  found  in  a  comparative  study  of  sonnet-writ- 
ing in  Shakespeare's  time.  The  great  majority  of 
students  have  been  forced  to  the  conclusion  that, 
while  the  conventional  spirit  and  method  of  con- 
temporary sonneteers  had  a  distinct  influence  upon 
the  poet  so  far  as  form  and  manner  were  concerned, 
the  content  of  the  Sonnets  had  a  vital  relation  to  his 
own  experience.  This  conclusion  is  based  upon 
the  fact  that  a  note  of  reality  seems  to  be  distinctly 
sounded  in  the  series ;  that  they  tell  a  story  or 
reveal  an  experience  which  is  definitely  outlined 
notwithstanding  the  mask  of  conventional  imagery 
and  phraseology  which  the  poet  employed ;  that 
throughout  the  entire  body  of  his  dramatic  work  he 
uniformly  and  consistently  keeps  in  touch  with  real- 
ity, using  historic  material  whenever  he  can  find  it 
adaptable  for  his  purpose,  and  allying  himself, 
apparently  by  instinct  as  well  as  by  intention,  with 
the  force  which  resides  in  real  things  or  in  the  deep 
and  rich  deposit  of  the  imagination  dealing,  as  in 
such  figures  as  Hamlet  or  Prospero,  with  the  great- 
est realities  of  experience ;  that  in  the  sensitiveness, 
the  capacity  for  devotion,  the  power  of  passion, 
which  the  Sonnets  reveal  they  so  entirely  express 


220  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

the    nature    of    Shakespeare   that    they   must    be 
accepted  as,  in  a  true  sense,  autobiographic. 

Those  who  regard  the  Sonnets  as  pure  and 
deliberate  autobiography,  containing  a  definite  con- 
fession to  be  literally  interpreted,  probably  stray  as 
far  from  the  truth  as  those  who  dissociate  the  poet 
entirely  from  his  work  and  regard  the  Sonnets  as 
technical  exercises  only.  The  habit  of  the  age  and 
the  marked  and  consistent  .objectivity  of  Shake- 
speare's mode  of  expression  make  it  highly  improb- 
able that  he  laid  his  heart  bare  by  putting  in 
historic  order  and  with  entire  fidelity  of  detail  a 
passional  experience  which  had  searched  his  spirit 
as  with  a  lighted  torch  held  aloft  in  the  darkest 
recesses  of  his  nature. 

The  truth  probably  lies  between  these  two 
extremes  of  interpretation  ;  it  seems  probable  that 
the  Sonnets  are  disclosures  of  the  poet's  experience 
without  being  transcriptive  of  his  actual  history ; 
that  they  embody  the  fruits  of  a  great  experience 
without  revealing  that  experience  in  its  historic 
order.  Literal,  consecutive  recitals  of  fact  the  Son- 
nets are  not,  but  they  are  autobiographic  in  the 
only  way  in  which  a  poet  of  Shakespeare's  spirit 
and  training,  living  in  his  period,  could  make  his 
art  the  vehicle  of  autobiography:  they  use  the 
material  which  experience  had  deposited  in  Shake- 
speare's nature,  but  they  hide  the  actual  happenings 
in  his  life  behind  the  veil  of  an  elaborate  art  and 
of  a  philosophy  with  which  the  thought  of  western 


THE  SONNETS  221 

Europe  was  saturated  in  his  time.  The  Sonnets 
may  be  read  as  the  poetic  record  of  an  emotional 
experience  which  left  lasting  traces  behind  it,  and 
as  a  disclosure  of  the  mind  of  the  poet;  but  they 
cannot  be  safely  read  as  an  exact  record  of  fact. 
The  poet,  as  Shelley  suggests,  was  willing  to 
intrust  his  secret  to  those  who  had  the  wit  to 
understand  it. 

The  dedication  of  the  Sonnets  was  written,  not 
by  their  author,  but  by  their  publisher,  and  has  fur- 
nished material  for  one  of  the  most  extensive  of 
the  many  controversies  which  have  centred  about 
Shakespeare : 

TO    .    THE    .    ONLIE    .    BEGETTER    .    OF    . 

THESE    .    INSVING    .    SONNETS    . 

M?    W    .    H    .    ALL    .    HAPPINESSE   . 

AND    .    THAT    .    ETERNITIE    . 

PROMISED    . 

BY    . 
OVR    .    EVER    -   LIVING    .    POET    . 

WISHETH    . 

THE    .    WELL  -  WISHING    . 

ADVENTVRER    .    IN    . 

SETTING    . 

FORTH   . 

T.  T. 

In  these  words  Thomas  Thorpe,  not  Shake- 
speare, addressed  a  patron  whom  the  research  and 
acumen  of  many  decades  of  investigation  and  spec- 
ulation have  not  been  able  to  identify  to  the  satis- 
faction of  a  majority  of  students.  For  many  years 
the  claims  of  William  Herbert,  Earl  of  Pembroke, 
were  urged  with  great  ingenuity  and  with  consid- 


222  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

erable  success.  This  young  nobleman  was  a  rep- 
resentative man  of  the  close  of  the  Elizabethan 
epoch.  Clarendon  describes  him  as  "very  well 
bred,  and  of  excellent  parts,  and  a  graceful  speaker 
upon  any  subject,  having  a  good  proportion  of 
Learning,  and  a  ready  Wit  to  apply  it  and  enlarge 
upon  it ;  of  a  pleasant  and  facetious  humour,  and  a 
disposition  affable,  generous,  and  magnificent." 
The  "  dark  lady  "  was  identified  with  Mary  Fitton, 
who  was  a  Maid  of  Honour  to  the  Queen,  of  a  gay 
and  pleasure-loving  disposition,  on  very  friendly 
terms  with  some  of  the  players  of  Shakespeare's 
company,  of  free  manners  and  easy  morals,  who  was 
finally  driven  from  the  Court  by  the  results  of  her 
intimacy  with  the  Earl  of  Pembroke.  The  claims 
of  Henry  Wriothesley,  Earl  of  Southampton, 
the  brilliant  and  popular  courtier,  scholar,  soldier, 
and  patron  of  the  theatre,  to  whom  Shakespeare 
dedicated  "  Venus  and  Adonis  "  and  "  The  Rape  of 
Lucrece,"  have  been  presented  with  much  force. 
Many  facts  in  the  careers  of  the  Earl  of  South- 
ampton and  of  the  Earl  of  Pembroke  meet  the 
requirements  of  the  few  and  uncertain  biographical 
data  furnished  by  the  Sonnets ;  but  the  acceptance 
of  either  of  these  noblemen  as  the  "  W.  H."  of  the 
dedication  raises  almost  as  many  questions  as  it 
answers. 

It  is  highly  improbable  that  a  dedication  written 
by  the  publisher  of  a  collection  of  poems,  which  he 
was  about  to  issue  without  authorization,  would  dis- 


THE   SONNETS 


223 


close  the  identity  of  the  chief  figure  in  the  drama  of 
passion  guarded  in  its  record  by  the  most  highly 
conventionalized  poetic  form  of  the  age.  It  is  more 
probable  that 
such  a  dedica- 
tion would  be 
addressed  to  a 
possible  patron 
of  the  volume 
or  to  a  personal 
friend  of  the 
p  ubl i  sher  — 
some  such  per- 
son  as  the 
printer,  Will- 
iam Hall,  whose 
claims  to  the 
mysterious  ini- 
tials "W.  H." 
Mr.  Lee  has 
brought  f or- 
w  a  r  d  as  the 
most  recent 
contribution  to 
a  discussion  which  will  never,  in  all  probability,  be 
finally  settled,  and  which  turns,  in  any  event,  upon 
a  matter  which  is  solely  one  of  intelligent  curiosity. 
The  supreme  value  of  the  Sonnets  lies  in  their 
beauty  and  completeness  as  works  of  art.  They  dis- 
close marked  inequalities  of  inspiration  and  of  work- 


HENRY   WRIOTHESLEY,    EARL   OF   SOUTHAMPTON. 

From  an  engraving  by  R.  Cooper,  after  the  original  of  Mirevelt, 
in  the  collection  of  the  Duke  of  Bedford. 


224  WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE 

manship ;  in  some  cases  they  are  prime  examples  of 
the  strained  imagery,  the  forced  fancy,  the  artificial 
style,  of  the  Elizabethan  sonneteer ;  but  again  and 
again  in  the  noble  sequence  the  poet  blends  experi- 
ence, philosophy,  and  the  most  sorely  over-used 
poetic  form  of  his  time  in  a  harmonious  whole 
which  appeals  with  equal  power  to  the  intellect  and 
to  the  sense  of  beauty.  The  artificial  frame  of 
fourteen  lines  becomes  fluid  in  his  hand ;  the 
emotion  which  penetrates  and  irradiates  it  rises  out 
of  the  depths  of  his  nature  ;  and  both  are  touched 
with  the  inimitable  magic  of  the  poet's  imagination. 
The  volume  in  which  the  Sonnets  were  published 
in  1609  contained  a  detached  poem  of  forty-nine 
stanzas  in  the  metre  of  "  The  Rape  of  Lucrece,"  in 
which  the  sorrows  of  a  young  girl,  betrayed  and 
deserted  by  her  lover,  are  set  forth  in  the  gentle, 
tender,  melodious  manner  of  Spenser.  Of  "  A 
Lover's  Complaint "  nothing  further  is  known  than 
this  fact.  It  has  no  relationship  with  the  Sonnets, 
and  is  in  a  wholly  different  key ;  but  there  is  no 
reason  why  Shakespeare  should  not  have  written  it 
in  the  early  lyrical  period.  Its  appearance  with  the 
Sonnets  makes  it  highly  probable  that  it  was  in 
circulation  among  Shakespeare's  friends  in  manu- 
script and  was  secured  by  Thorpe  in  the  same  way 
in  which  copies  of  the  Sonnets  were  obtained.  The 
poem  is  in  the  manner  of  the  conventional  pastoral 
so  popular  at  the  same  time,  and  is  pervaded  by  an 
air  of  quiet  melancholy 'and  gentle  beauty.  Com- 


THE    SONNETS  225 

plaints  were  sung  in  many  keys  by  the  Elizabethan 
poets,  and  "  A  Lover's  Complaint  "  was  probably  an 
early  experiment  in  an  imitative  mood.  f 

Robert  Chester's  "  Love's  Martyr ;  or,  Rosalind 
Complaint,"  published  in  1601,  contained,  accord- 
ing to  the  preface,  "  diverse  poetical  essays  on  ... 
the  Turtle  and  Phoenix,  done  by  the  best  and  chief- 
est  of  our  modern  writers."  Shakespeare's  contri- 
bution to  this  collection  of  verse  was  "  The  Phoenix 
and  the  Turtle,"  the  most  enigmatical  of  his  works. 
This  poem  of  thirteen  stanzas  of  four  lines  each, 
concluding  with  a  Threnos  in  five  stanzas  of  three 
lines  each,  is  a  poetical  requiem  for  the  Phoenix  and 
the  Turtle,  whose  love  "  was  married  chastity." 
Among  the  contributors  to  the  collection  were 
Shakespeare's  great  contemporaries,  Jonson,  Chap- 
man, Marston ;  but  neither  the  purpose  nor  the 
occasion  of  the  publication  has  yet  been  discovered, 
nor  has  any  light  been  shed  from  any  quarter  on 
the  allegory  whose  meaning  Shakespeare  seems  to 
have  hidden  from  posterity  in  this  bafHing  poem. 
Emerson  suggested  that  a  prize  be  offered  for 
an  essay  which  "  should  explain,  by  a  historical 
research  into  the  poetic  myths  and  tendencies  of  the 
age  in  which  it  was  written,  the  frame  and  allusions 
of  the  poem ; "  but  although  much  research  has 
been  devoted  to  this  object  and  many  metaphysical, 
political,  ecclesiastical,  and  historical  interpretations 
have  been  suggested,  "  The  Phcenix  and  the  Turtle  " 
remains  an  unsolved  enigma. 


226 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


In  1599  William  Jaggard,  who,  like  Thorpe,  laid 
hands  upon  any  unpublished  writing  which  had 
secured  popularity  and  promised  success  to  a 
venturesome  publisher,  issued  a  small  anthology  of 
contemporary  verse  under  the  title  of  "  The  Pas- 
sionate Pilgrim. 
By  W.  Shake- 
speare." The 
first  two  selec- 
tions were  Son- 
nets by  Shake- 
speare hitherto 
unpublished, 
and  there  were 
three  poems 
taken  from 
"Love's  La- 
bour's Lost," 
which  appeared 
in  1591.  The 
collection  was 
rep  ri  n  ted  in 
1612  with  the 
addition  of  two 
poems  by  Thomas  Heywood.  Shakespeare  appears 
to  have  borne  the  affront  in  silence,  but  Heywood 
protested,  in  a  dedicatory  epistle  which  appeared  in 
that  year,  against  the  injury  done  him,  and  declared 
that  Shakespeare  was  much  offended  "  with  Mr. 
Jaggard  that  (altogether  unknown  to  him)  presumed 


THE   SONNETS  227 

to  make  so  bold  with  his  name."  This  protest  was 
not  without  effect,  for  a  new  title-page  was  issued 
from  which  Shakespeare's  name  was  omitted.  Of 
the  twenty-one  pieces  which  make  up  "  The  Pas- 
sionate Pilgrim,"  only  five  can  be  ascribed  to 
Shakespeare.  The  collection  was  a  miscellany, 
"  a  rag-picker's  bag  of  stolen  goods,"  put  together 
without  authority  from  the  poets  whose  work  was 
stolen,  and  the  use  of  Shakespeare's  name  is  one 
evidence  of  its  weight  with  readers. 


CHAPTER   X 

THE   HISTORICAL   PLAYS 

THE  period  of  Shakespeare's  apprenticeship 
ended  about  1596;  the  succeeding  four  or  five 
years  show  him  in  full  possession  of  his  art  and  his 
material,  though  the  deeper  phases  of  experience 
were  still  before  him  and  the  full  maturity  of  his 
genius  was  to  be  coincident  with  the  searching  of 
his  spirit  in  the  period  of  the  Tragedies.  The  last 
half-decade  of  the  sixteenth  century  were  golden 
years  in  the  life  of  the  rising  dramatist.  He  had 
made  his  place  in  the  world ;  he  had  learned  his 
craft ;  he  had  come  to  clear  self-consciousness ;  the 
intoxication  of  the  possession  of  the  poetic  imagina- 
tion and  the  gift  of  poetic  expression  was  upon  him  ; 
he  had  immense  zest  in  life,  and  life  was  at  full-tide 
in  his  veins  and  in  the  world  about  him.  The 
Queen  was  at  the  height  of  her  splendid  career; 
the  country  had  grown  into  clear  perception  of  its 
vital  force  and  the  possible  greatness  of  its  fortunes ; 
English  energy  and  courage  were  preparing  the 
new  soil  of  the  new  world  for  the  seeds  of  a  greater 
England  at  the  ends  of  the  earth ;  London  was  full 
of  brilliant  and  powerful  personalities,  touched  with 

228 


THE   HISTORICAL  PLAYS  229 

the  vital  impulse  of  the  age,  and  alive  in  emotion, 
imagination,  and  will.  It  was  a  time  of  great  works 
of  art  and  of  action;  in  the  two  worlds 'of  thought 
and  of  affairs  the  tide  of  creative  energy  was  at  the 
flood. 

The  genius  of  Spenser  bore  its  ripest  fruit 
in  "  -Colin  Clout,"  the  "  Epithalamium,"  and  the 
concluding  books  of  the  "  Faerie  Queene."  Sid- 
ney's noble  "  Apologie  for  Poesie,"  which  was  in  the 
key  not  only  of  the  occupations  and  resources  of  his 
mind  but  of  his  life,  appeared  in  1595,  and  a  group 
of  Bacon's  earlier  essays  in  1597.  Chapman's 
"  Homer "  and  Fairfax's  "  Tasso  "  enriched  the 
English  language  with  two  masterpieces  of  transla- 
tion. Hooker  and  Hakluyt  were  writing  and  pub- 
lishing. Among  the  playwrights  are  to  be  found 
the  great  names  of  Dekker,  Jonson,  Middleton, 
Heywood,  Marston,  and  Chapman.  The  men  who 
had  possession  of  the  stage  when  the  poet  came  up 
from  Stratford  —  Marlowe,  Peele,  Greene,  Lodge, 
Nash,  Kyd,  and  Lyly  —  had  been  succeeded  by 
Shakespeare's  generation.  That  he  should  have 
detached  himself  from  this  great  group  and  made  a 
distinct  impression  on  his  contemporaries  is  not  the 
least  among  the  many  evidences  of  his  extraordinary 
power.  English  literature  was  in  one  of  its  noblest 
periods,  and  Shakespeare  shared  an  impulse  which, 
like  a  great  tide,  carried  men  of  every  kind  of  power 
to  the  furthest  limits  of  their  possible  achievement. 

At  no  period  of  his  life  was  Shakespeare  more 


230  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

keenly  observant,  more  intellectually  alert,  more 
inventive,  more  joyous  in  spirit,  more  spontaneous 
and  poetic.  He  had  solved  the  problem  of  his  rela- 
tion to  his  time  by  discovering  his  gift,  acquiring 
his  tools,  and  discerning  his  opportunity;  he  had 
ease  of  mind  and  openness  of  imagination.  He 
gave  himself  up  to  the  joy  of  life,  and  lived  in 
its  full  tide  with  immense  delight.  He  was  not 
only  in  the  world  but  of  it.  Even  in  this  eager  and 
golden  period  so  meditative  a  mind  could  not  escape 
those  previsions  of  tragedy  and  fate  which  are  never 
far  off ;  and  sorrow  did  not  pass  by  the  house- 
hold at  Stratford,  for  in  August,  1596,  accord- 
ing to  the  parish  record,  Hamnet,  Shakespeare's 
only  son,  was  buried.  In  this  year  "  King  John  " 
was  written,  and  it  has  been  surmised  that  in  the 
pathetic  and  beautiful  character  of  Arthur,  which  is 
essentially  unhistoric,  the  poet  was  portraying  his 
own  son,  and  in  the  touching  lament  of  Constance 
giving  voice  to  his  own  sorrow.  This  loss,  which 
must  have  been  poignant,  was  apparently  the  only 
shadow  on  these  prosperous  years  when  the  poet 
was  in  his  earliest  prime. 

History  and  comedy  absorbed  the  imagination 
and  divided  the  creative  energy  of  Shakespeare 
from  1596  to  1600.  Of  the  ten  plays  founded  on 
English  history,  "  King  John  "  serves  as  a  prelude, 
with  "  Richard  II.,"  the  two  parts  of  "  Henry  IV.," 
"  Henry  V.,"  the  three  parts  of  "  Henry  VI.,"  and 
"  Richard  III."  as  a  chronicle  play  on  a  great 


THE   HISTORICAL   PLAYS 


231 


scale;  while  "  Henry  VIII."  may  be  taken  as  an 
epilogue.  The  plays  were  not,  however,  written 
in  historical  sequence,  nor  did  Shakespeare  have 
any  intention  at  the  start  of  making  a  connected 
treatment  of  a  stirring  and  dramatic  period  in 
English  his- 
tory. He  found 
the  old  plays 
dealing  with 
Henry  VI. 
ready  to  his 
hand,  as  has 
been  noted,  and 
used  them  as 
material,  touch- 
ing "Henry 
VI."  very  light- 
ly and  probably 
only  in  the  way 
of  adaptation 
and  revision, 
and  the  inter- 
polation of  a 
few  characteristic  scenes  and  passages.  "  Richard 
j_II."...came  a  little  later  in  time,  and  is  so  evidently 
modelled  after  Marlowe  that  its  Shakespearian  au- 
thorship has  been  questioned  by  very  competent 
critics.  It  is  full  of  echoes  and  reminiscences  of 
Marlowe's  manner;  it  is  tempestuous,  turbulent, 
and  violent ;  it  is  history  dramatized  rather  than 


JOHN    FLETCHER. 
From  a  picture  in  the  possession  of  the  Earl  of  Clarendon. 


232  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

a  true  historical  drama ;'  but  the  figure  of  Richard 
which  dominates  the  play  and  charges  it  with  vital 
ity,  is  as  clearly  realized  and  as  superbly  drawn  as 
any  character  in  the  whole  range  of  the  plays.  The 
lack  of  artistic  coherence  in  the  play  is  due  to  the 
inharmonious  elements  in  it  —  the  attempt  to  com- 
bine the  method  of  Marlowe  and  the  spirit  of  Shake- 
speare. The  framework  of  the  play  was  conven- 
tional even  in  Shakespeare's  time ;  the  manner 
is  so  lyrical  that  it  is  a  tragic  poem  rather  than 
a  dramatic  tragedy ;  nevertheless,  Richard  is  drawn 
with  a  hand  so  firm,  a  realism  so  modern,  that 
a  play  of  very  inferior  construction  becomes 
immensely  effective  for  stage  purposes,  and  has 
been  almost  continuously  popular  from  its  first 
representation.  Shakespeare  followed  Holinshed 
and  Marlowe  in  writing  "Richard  III.";  but  he 
put  into  the  play  that  element  of  ethical  purpose 
which  stamps  all  his  work  and  separates  it  in 
fundamental  conception  from  the  work  of  Marlowe. 
The  parallelisms  between  "  Richard  II."  and 
Marlowe's  "Edward  II."  are  so  obvious  that  it 
is  impossible  to  escape  the  inference  that  Shake- 
speare was  still  under  the  spell  of  the  tremendous 
personality  of  the  author  of  "  Tamburlaine  " ;  but 
there  are  signs  of  liberation.  There  is  a  change  of 
subject  from  the  fortunes  of  the  House  of  York 
to  those  of  the  House  of  Lancaster ;  blank  verse, 
to  which  Marlowe  rigidly  adhered,  gives  place  to 
frequent  use  of  rhyme ;  'and  the  atmosphere  ir 


THE   HISTORICAL  PLAYS 


233 


which  the  action  takes  place  is  softened  and  clari- 
fied. The  weak  king's  eloquence  often  betrays 
Shakespeare's  inimitable  touch,  and  tbe  superb 
eulogy  on  England  spoken  by  John  of  Gaunt  is 
a  perfect  example  of  Shakespeare's  use  of  the 
grand  manner.  Still  following  Holinshed,  and 
under  the  influence  of  Marlowe,  the  dramatist 
was  swiftly  working  out  his  artistic  emancipation. 
To  this  period  belongs  "  King  John,"  which  was 
probably  completed  about  1595,  and  which  was  a 
recast  of  the  older  play  of  "  The  Troublesome 
Raigne  of  John,  King  of  England,"  published  in 
1591.  The  conventional  construction  was  not 
greatly  modified  by  Shakespeare,  but  the  play 
marks  the  transition  from  the  chronicle  play  to 
the  true  drama;  in  which  incidents  and  characters 
are  selected  for  their  dramatic  significance,  a 
dramatic  motive  introduced,  dramatic  movement 
traced,  and  a  climax  reached.  The  older  play- 
wrights, dealing  with  the  events  of  a  whole  reign, 
would  have  given  the  play  an  epical  or  narrative 
quality;  Shakespeare  selected,  compressed,  fore- 
shortened, and  grouped  events  and  figures  in  such 
a  way  as  to  secure  connected  action,  the  develop- 
ment of  character,  and  a  final  catastrophe  which  is 
impressive,  if  not  intrinsically  dramatic.  He  in- 
stinctively omitted  certain  coarse  scenes  which  were 
in  the  older  play ;  he  brought  into  clear  light  and 
consistency  certain  characters  which  were  roughly 
sketched  in  the  earlier  work ;  in  the  scene  between 


234  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Hubert  and  Arthur  he  struck  a  new  note  of  tender- 
ness and  pathos ;  while  in  giving  marked  promi- 
nence to  the  humour  of  Faulconbridge  he  opened 
the  way  for  that  blending  of  comedy  with  tragedy 
and  history  which  is  one  of  the  marks,  not  only  of 
his  maturity,  but  of  his  greatness.  The  play  has 
no  hero,  and  is  not  free  from  the  faults  of  the  long 
line  of  dramas  from  which  it  descended  and  to  which 
it  belongs,  but  Shakespeare's  creative  energy  is  dis- 
tinctly at  work  in  it. 

The  growth  of  the  poet's  mind  and  art  was  rapid, 
and,  in  its  large  lines,  is  readily  followed  ;  but  it  was 
a  vital,  not  a  logical,  development,  and  it  was  not, 
therefore,  entirely  orderly  and  harmonious.  In  his 
later  work  he  sometimes  returned  to  his  earlier 
manner ;  at  his  maturity  he  more  than  once  took 
up  existing  material,  and  was  content  to  retouch 
without  reconstructing  it.  The  plays  vary  greatly 
in  quality  and  insight ;  it  would  not  be  easy  to  find 
in  the  work  of  any  other  poet  of  the  first  rank  more 
marked  inequalities.  Many  of  the  sonnets  touch 
the  very  limits  of  perfection ;  others  are  halting, 
artificial,  full  of  the  conceits  and  forced  imagery  of 
the  day.  The  early  historical  plays  are  often  pano- 
ramic rather  than  dramatic;  "Henry  IV.,"  on  the 
other  hand,  is  sustained  throughout  its  wide  range 
of  interest  and  action  by  the  full  force  of  Shake- 
speare's genius.  This  inequality  in  the  plays,  the 
irregularities  of  growth  which  often  present  them- 
selves, and  the  occasional  reversions  to  the  conven- 


THE   HISTORICAL  PLAYS  235 

tional  construction  which  Shakespeare  inherited 
from  his  predecessors  or  to  his  own  earlier  man- 
ner, humanize  the  poet,  bring  his  work  well  within 
the  range  of  the  literary  evolution  of  his  time,  and, 
while  leaving  the  miracle  of  his  genius  unexplained, 
make  his  career  and  his  achievement  intelligible  and 
explicable. 

The  brilliant  years  between  1596  and  1600  or 
1601  were  divided  between  history  and  comedy; 
between  the  splendid  show  and  pageant  of  society 
as  illustrated  in  the  story  of  the  English  kings,  and 
the  variety,  the  humour,  the  inconsistency  of  men,  as 
these  qualities  are  brought  out  in  social  life.  The 
"Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  and  the  "Merchant  of 
Venice,"  in  which  the  genius  of  the  dramatist 
shines  in  full  splendour,  probably  antedated  by  a  few 
months  the  writing  of  the  two  parts  of  "  Henry  IV." 
and  of  "  Henry  V.,"  but  these  plays  are  so  nearly 
contemporaneous  that  their  exact  order  of  produc- 
tion is  unimportant.  The  historical  plays  may  be 
grouped  together  for  convenience,  keeping  in  mind 
the  fact  that  the  dramatist  was  apparently  finding 
relief  from  dealing  with  great  matters  of  state  and 
great  historical  personages  by  turning  from  time  to 
time  to  comedy,  and  perhaps  by  writing  comedy 
simultaneously  with  history. 

The  first  part  of  "  Henry  IV."  was  written  not 
later  than  1597;  the  second  part  followed  it  after 
an  interval  of  not  more  than  two  years.  The 
sources  of  the  play  are  to  be  found  in  Holinshed 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


and   an   earlier  chronicle  play  of   little  merit   but 
marked    popularity,    "  The    Famous    Victories    of 

Henry  V."  The  play  fol- 
lows history  with  devia- 
tions, the  most  important 
being  the  bold  stroke  of 
making  the  Prince  and 
Hotspur  of  the  same  age ; 
in  the  earlier  drama  the 
hints  of  the  rich  humour, 
the  inimitable  comic  ac- 
tion of  Shakespeare's 
work,  are  also  found.  But 
that  which  came  into  the 
hands  of  the  dramatist  as 
crude  ore  left  it  pure 
gold,  stamped  with  inef- 
faceable images.  In  the 
use  of  this  raw  material, 
Shakespeare  came  to  his 
own  and  made  it  his  own 
by  virtue  of  searching  in- 
sight into  its  ethical  sig- 
nificance and  complete 
mastery  of  its  artistic  re- 
sources. Other  plays  show 
the  poet  in  higher  moods, 
but  none  discloses  so 
completely  the  full  range 
of  his  power;  construe- 


THE   HISTORICAL   PLAYS 


237 


tion,  characterization,  pathos,  humour,  wit,  dramatic 
energy,  and  the  magical  Shakespearian  touch  are 
found  in  "  Henry  IV."  in  free  and  harmonious  unity 
of  dramatic  form.  In  no  other  play  is  there  greater 
ease  in  dealing  with  apparently  discordant  elements; 
nor  is  there  elsewhere  a  firmer  grasp  of  circum- 
stances, events,  and  persons  in  dramatic  sequence 
and  action.  The  play  has  a  noble  breadth  of  inter- 
est and  action,  a  freedom  of  movement  and  vitality 
of  characterization,  which  give  it  the  first  place 
among  the  historical  dramas. 

The  humour  of  Falstaff  and  the  greed  and  vul- 
garity of  his  ragged,  disreputable  but  immortal  fol- 
lowers reenforce  the  dignity  of  the  play,  which  is 
sustained  throughout  at  a  great  height.  Nothing 
which  is  human  escapes  the  clear,  piercing,  kindly 
gaze  of  this  young  master  of  character  and  destiny ; 
he  sees  so  broadly  and  deeply  that  nothing  repels 
him  which  has  any  touch  of  reality  or  soundness  in 
it.  In  his  hands,  and  preeminently  in  this  play, 
the  drama  broadens  to  compass  the  full  range  of 
humour  and  character  and  experience ;  and  the 
tragic  and  humorous  are  blended,  as  in  life,  without 
incongruity  or  violation  of  the  essential  unities  of 
human  action  and  knowledge.  Henry  IV.  and 
Hotspur  are  not  blurred  in  outline,  nor  is  the  sig- 
nificance of  their  struggle  obscured  by  the  roister- 
ers and  thieves  who  are  at  the  heels  of  Falstaff. 
The  heroic  note  of  the  old  ideals  of  chivalry  is 
sounded  as  distinctly  as  if  the  broad,  rollicking 


238  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

humour  of  Falstaff  had  no  existence.  Falstaff  is 
one  of  the  most  marvellous  of  Shakespeare's  crea- 
tions ;  a  gross  braggart,  without  conscience,  and  as 
simply  and  naturally  unmoral  as  if  there  were  no 
morals,  Shakespeare  has  drawn  him  with  such 
matchless  vitality  that,  although  the  stage  is 
crowded  with  great  figures,  he  holds  it  as  if  it  were 
his  own.  Sir  John  Oldcastle,  whose  character  un- 
doubtedly gave  Shakespeare  a  rough  sketch  of 
Falstaff,  and  whose  name  was  originally  used  by 
Shakespeare,  appears  in  the  earlier  play  which  the 
poet  had  before  him ;  in  deference  to  the  objections 
of  the  descendants  of  Sir  John,  the  name  was 
changed  in  the  printed  play,  and  became  Falstaff, 
but  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the  earlier  name 
was  retained  in  the  acting  play.  There  was  ground 
for  the  objection  to  its  use,  for  Sir  John  Oldcastle 
was  a  Lollard  and  a  martyr. 

Shakespeare  created  a  kind  of  English  Bacchus 
at  a  time  when  every  kind  of  fruit  or  grain  that 
could  be  made  into  a  beverage  was  drunk  in  vast 
quantities ;  and  sack,  which  was  FalstafFs  native 
element,  was  both  strong  and  sweet.  Falstaff  is 
saved  by  his  humour  and  his  genius ;  he  lies,  steals, 
boasts,  and  takes  to  his  legs  in  time  of  peril,  with 
such  superb  consistency  and  in  such  unfailing  good 
spirits  that  we  are  captivated  by  his  vitality.  It 
would  be  as  absurd  to  apply  ethical  standards  to 
him  as  to  Silenus  or  Bacchus ;  he  is  a  creature  of 
the  elemental  forces  ;  a  personification  of  the  vitality 


THE   HISTORICAL   PLAYS  239 

which  is  in  bread  and  wine  ;  a  satyr  become  human, 
but  moving  buoyantly  and  joyfully  in  an  unmoral 
world.  And  yet  the  touch  of  the  ethical  law  is  on 
him ;  he  is  not  a  corrupter  by  intention,  and  he  is 
without  malice ;  but  as  old  age  brings  its  searching 
revelation  of  essential  characteristics,  his  humour 
broadens  into  coarseness,  his  buoyant  animalism 
degenerates  into  lust;  and  he  is  saved  from  con- 
tempt at  the  end  by  one  of  those  exquisite  touches 
with  which  the  great-hearted  poet  loves  to  soften 
and  humanize  degeneration. 

"  Henry  IV."  is  notable  not  only  for  the  range  and 
variety  of  types  presented,  but  also  for  the  freedom 
of  manner  which  the  poet  permits  himself.  About 
half  the  first  part  is  written  in  prose.  Shakespeare 
was  not  alone  among  his  contemporaries  in  break- 
ing with  the  earlier  tradition  which  imposed  verse 
as  the  only  form  upon  the  drama;  Jonson,  Beau- 
mont and  Fletcher  used  both  prose  and  verse  in 
the  same  drama ;  but  Shakespeare  alone  showed 
equal  mastery  over  both  forms.  His  prose  is  as 
characteristic  and  as  perfect  as  his  verse ;  he  turns 
indifferently  from  one  to  the  other  and  is  at  ease 
with  either.  He  makes  the  transition  in  many 
places  for  the  sake  of  securing  variety  and  height- 
ening certain  effects  which  he  wishes  to  produce, 
as  he  often  introduces  humorous  passages  into  the 
most  tragic  episodes. 

Mr.  Sill  makes  the  interesting  suggestion  that 
verse  being  the  natural  form  of  expression  for  emo- 


240 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


tion,  Shakespeare  instinctively  turned  to  prose  when 
he  was  presenting  ideas  detached  from  emotion,  when 

he  wished  to  be 
logical  rather 
than  moving, 
and  practical  or 
jocular  rather 
than  philosoph- 
ical or  serious ; 
and,  verse  be- 
ing essentially 
based  on  order 
and  regularity, 
the  poet  turned 
to  prose  when- 
ever he  wished 
to  give  expres- 
sion to  frenzy 
or  madness. 
There  would 
have  been  essential  incongruity  in  putting  blank 
verse  into  the  mouths  of  clowns,  fools,  drunkards, 
and  madmen.  These  suggestions  are  of  special 
interest  when  they  are  applied  to  "  Hamlet." 

In  "  Henry  IV.,"  as  in  "  The  Merry  Wives  of 
Windsor"  and  "The  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  the 
references  to  Warwickshire  are  unmistakable ;  the 
dramatist  was  still  too  near  his  youth  to  have 
forgotten  persons  and  localities  known  in  his  boy- 
hood. 


FRANCIS   BEAUMONT. 
From  a  picture  in  the  possession  of  Colonel  Harcourt. 


THE    HISTORICAL    PLAYS  241 

"  Henry  V.,"  drawn  from  the  same  sources,  is  a 
continuation  of  "  Henry  IV.,"  and  presents  in  the 
splendid  maturity  of  the  king  one  of  SrTakespeare's 
great  men  of  action  ;  a  type  in  which  his  own  time 
was  rich,  and  in  the  delineation  of  which,  being 
himself  a  man  of  reflection  and  expression,  the 
poet  found  infinite  satisfaction.  In  this  play 
the  events  of  a  reign  are  grouped  for  dramatic 
effectiveness,  and  war  is  dramatized  on  a  great 
scale.  The  material  is  essentially  epical,  but  the 
treatment  is  so  vigorous  that  the  play,  while  not 
dramatic  in  the  deepest  sense,  has  the  dignity  and 
interest  of  a  drama.  The  introduction  of  the 
Chorus,  in  which  the  dramatist  speaks  in  person, 
shows  how  deeply  he  had  meditated  on  his  art,  and 
how  deliberately  he  had  rejected  the  conventional 
unities  of  time,  place,  and  action  for  the  sake  of  the 
higher  and  more  inclusive  unity  of  vital  experience. 
No  other  play  so  nobly  expresses  the  deepening  of 
the  national  consciousness  at  the  end  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  and  the  rising  tide  of  national  feeling. 
The  play  is  a  great  national  epic ;  and  the  secret 
of  the  expansion  and  authority  of  the  English 
race  is  to  be  found  in  it.  It  was  presented  in  the 
last  year  of  the  century,  and  probably  in  the  Globe 
Theatre,  then  recently  opened. 

"  King  Henry  VIII."  was  written  at  least  ten 
years  later,  and  is  distinctly  inferior  to  the  historical 
plays  of  the  decade  which  closed  with  the  produc- 
tion of  "  Henry  V.,"  and  is  generally  regarded  as 


242  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

a  piece  of  composite  work,  Fletcher  probably  com- 
pleting that  which  Shakespeare  had  planned,  but 
of  which  he  had  written  only  the  first  two  acts. 

The  historical  plays  belong,  as  a  whole,  to  Shake- 
speare's earliest  period  of  productiveness ;  they  keep 
the  record  of  his  apprenticeship ;  they  find  their 
place  in  the  first  stage  of  his  development.  This 
was  due  only  in  a  subordinate  way  to  accident; 
there  was  reason  for  it  in  the  psychology  of  his 
art.  The  material  for  these  plays  was  ready  to  his 
hand  in  the  earlier  chronicle  plays  in  the  libraries 
of  the  theatres,  and  in  the  records  of  Holinshed 
and  Hall ;  and  there  was  ample  stimulus  for  their 
production  in  their  popularity.  But  other  and 
deeper  sources  of  attraction  are  not  far  to  seek. 
These  plays  mark  the  transition  from  the  epic  to 
the  drama;  from  the  story  of  events  and  persons 
as  shaped  by  fate  to  the  story  of  events  and  persons 
as  they  disclose  the  fashioning  of  character  by 
action  and  the  reaction  of  character  on  events, 
knitting  men  and  actions  together  in  a  logical 
sequence  and  a  dramatic  order.  The  historical 
plays  find  their  logical  place  in  the  order  of  devel- 
opment between  the  old  plays  dealing  with  histori- 
cal subjects  and  the  masterpieces  of  Shakespeare 
and  his  contemporaries;  and  in  the  unfolding  of 
Shakespeare's  art  they  hold  the  same  middle  place. 
These  plays  preserve  the  characteristics  of  the 
older  plays  and  predict  the  fully  developed  drama ; 
they  do  not  reveal  the  Ml  play  of  the  poet's  genius 


THE   HISTORICAL  PLAYS  243 

nor  the  perfect  maturity  of  his  art,  although  the 
plays  which  deal  with  Henry  IV.  and  Henry  V. 
reveal  the  full  range  of  his  interests  and  his  gifts. 
In  these  plays  the  young  poet  put  himself  in 
deepest  touch  with  the  life  of  his  race,  and,  in 
bringing  to  clear  consciousness  the  race  spirit, 
brought  out  with  the  utmost  distinctness  the  racial 
qualities  of  his  own  genius.  He  is  preeminently 
the  English  poet,  not  only  by  virtue  of  his  suprem- 
acy as  an  artist,  but  by  virtue  of  the  qualities  of 
his  mind;  and  these  qualities  were  developed  and 
thrown  into  striking  relief  by  the  historical  plays. 
His  greatest  work  was  in  other  fields,  but  through 
no  other  work  has  he  impressed  himself  so  deeply 
on  the  imagination  of  the  men  of  his  own  race. 
He  vitalized  a  great  section  of  English  history, 
and  has  made  it  live  before  the  eyes  of  ten  gener- 
ations ;  he  set  the  figures  of  great  Englishmen 
on  so  splendid  a  stage  that  they  personify  finally 
and  for  all  time  the  characteristics  of  the  English 
race ;  he  so  exalted  liberty  as  represented  by  the 
English  temper  and  institutions  that,  more  than 
any  statesman,  he  has  made  patriotism  the  deepest 
passion  in  the  hearts  of  Englishmen.  No  other 
poet  has  stood  so  close  to  the  English  people  or 
affected  them  so  deeply;  and  from  the  days  when 
the  earliest  popular  applause  welcomed  "  Henry 
VI."  on  the  stage  of  The  Theatre,  The  Rose,  and 
The  Globe,  to  these  later  times  when  Irving's 
Wolsey  crowds  the  stalls  of  the  Lyceum,  Shake- 


244 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


speare  has  been  the  foremost  teacher  of  English 
history.  There  are  many  who,  if  they  were 
as  frank  as  Chatham,  would  confess  that  they 
learned  their  history  chiefly  from  him. 

In  these  plays, 
moreover,  the 
young  poet  trained 
himself  to  be  a 
dramatist  by  deal- 
ing with  men  under 
historical  condi- 
tions ;  with  men  in 
action.  The  es- 
sence of  the  drama 
as  distinguished 
from  other  literary 
forms  is  action,  and 
in  the  historical 
plays  action  is 
thrown  into  the 
most  striking  re- 
lief; sometimes  at 
the  sacrifice  of 


SEAL  OF  THE   ROYAL   DRAMATIC   COLLEGE. 


the  complete  devel- 
opment of  the  actors.  Before  taking  up  the  pro- 
foundest  problems  of  individual  destiny  or  entering 
into  the  world  of  pure  ideality,  Shakespeare  studied 
well  the  world  of  actuality.  On  a  narrower  stage, 
but  in  a  higher  light,  he  dealt  with  the  relation  of 
the  individual  to  the  political  order,  and  showed 


THE   HISTORICAL   PLAYS  245 

on  a  great  scale  the  development  of  character  in 
relation  to  practical  ends.  The  depths  of  his 
spiritual  insight  and  the  heights  of  his  art  are  to 
be  found  in  the  Tragedies ;  but  the  breadth,  com- 
prehensiveness, and  full  human  sympathy  of  his 
genius  are  to  be  found  in  the  historical  plays ;  and 
in  these  plays,  at  the  very  beginning  of  his  career, 
appeared  that  marvellous  sanity  which  kept  him 
poised  in  essential  harmony  between  the  divergent 
activities  and  aspects  of  life,  gave  him  clearness  of 
vision  and  steadiness  of  will,  and  made  him  the 
master  of  the  secrets  of  character  and  destiny.  The 
play  of  the  divine  law,  which  binds  the  deed  to  the 
doer,  and  so  moralizes  experience  and  makes  it 
significant,  is  nowhere  more  clearly  exhibited  than 
in  these  many-sided  dramas,  with  their  rich  diver- 
sity of  character  and  their  wide  range  of  action. 
Shakespeare  is  one  of  the  greatest  of  ethical 
teachers,  not  by  intention,  but  by  virtue  of  the 
depth  and  clearness  of  his  vision.  The  historical 
plays  reveal  the  justice  of  God  working  itself  out 
through  historical  events  and  in  the  lives  of  histori- 
cal persons ;  with  the  constant  perception  that  no 
man  is  wholly  good  or  evil ;  that  out  of  things  evil 
good  often  flows ;  that  sin  turns  often,  through 
the  penitence  of  humility  and  service,  into  blessed- 
ness ;  and  that  about  the  certain  and  evident  play 
of  the  divine  justice  there  is  a  mercy  which  is  a 
constant  mediation,  and  hints,  at  times,  at  a  re- 
demption as  inclusive  as  humanity. 


246  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

Schlegel  has  well  said  of  the  historical  plays  that 
they  are  "  a  mirror  for  kings."  In  no  other  litera- 
ture is  there  so  complete  a  portraiture  of  the  gran- 
deur of  the  kingly  office  and  the  uncertainty  of 
the  kingly  character;  the  pathos  of  the  contrast 
between  the  weak  man  and  the  great  place  is  often 
searching  to  the  verge  of  irony.  Shakespeare  never 
permits  his  kings  to  forget  that  they  are  men,  and 
the  splendour  of  their  fortunes  sometimes  serves 
to  bring  into  ruthless  light  the  inadequacy  of  their 
natural  gifts  for  the  great  responsibilities  laid  upon 
them.  The  trappings  of  royalty  heighten  the  crimi- 
nality of  John  and  Richard  III.;  the  eloquent  senti- 
mentality of  Richard  II.  and  the  ineffective  saintli- 
ness  of  Henry  VI.  are  thrown  into  high  relief  by  the 
background  of  royal  position;  the  well-conceived  and 
resolute  policy  of  Henry  IV.  and  the  noble  energy 
and  decision  of  Henry  V.  —  Shakespeare's  typical 
king  and  the  personification  of  the  heroic,  virile, 
executive  qualities  of  the  English  nature  —  take  on 
epical  proportions  from  the  vantage-ground  of  the 
throne. 

The  contrast  between  the  man  and  the  king  some- 
times deepens  into  tragedy  when  the  desires  and 
passions  of  the  man  are  brought  into  collision  with 
the  duties  of  the  king;  for  the  king  is  always  con- 
ceived as  the  incarnation  of  the  State,  the  personi- 
fication of  society.  His  deed  reacts,  not  only  upon 
himself,  but  upon  the  community  of  which  he  is  the 
head,  and  whose  fortunes  are  inextricably  bound  up 


THE   HISTORICAL  PLAYS  247 

with  his  fortunes.  In  the  plays  dealing  with  histor- 
ical subjects  Shakespeare  exhibits  the  divine  order 
as  that  order  is  embodied  in  the  State,  aYid  the  trag- 
edies which  occupy  the  great  stage  of  public  life 
arise  from  the  collision  of  the  individual  with  the 
State,  of  the  family  with  the  State,  and  of  the 
Church  with  the  State.  The  political  insight  and 
wisdom  shown  in  this  comprehensive  ethical  grasp 
of  the  relation  of  the  individual  to  society  in  institu- 
tional life  are  quite  beyond  the  achievements  of  any 
statesman  in  the  range  of  English  history;  for 
statecraft  is  everywhere,  in  the  exposition  of  the 
dramatist,  the  application  of  universal  principles  of 
right  and  wise  living  to  the  affairs  of  State.  Thus, 
on  the  great  stage  of  history,  Shakespeare,  in  the 
spirit  of  the  poet  and  in  the  manner  of  the  drama- 
tist, dramatized  the  spirit  of  man  working  out  its 
destiny  under  historic  conditions. 


CHAPTER   XI 

THE   COMEDIES 

DURING  these  prosperous  five  or  six  years  Shake- 
speare's hand  turned ,  readily  from  history  to  com- 
edy and  from  comedy  to  history;  the  exact  order 
in  which  the  plays  of  the  period  were  written  is 
unimportant  so  long  as  we  are  able  to  identify  the 
group  as  a  whole.  The  rising  tide  of  creative 
energy,  his  mounting  fortunes,  and  the  deep  fasci- 
nation of  the  spectacle  of  life  evoked  his  humour 
and  gave  free  play  to  the  gayety  of  his  nature 
and  the  buoyancy  of  a  mind  which  played  like 
lambent  lightning  over  the  whole  surface  of 
experience  and  knowledge.  It  is  probable  that 
he  was  at  work  on  several  plays  at  the  same  time ; 
taking  up  history  or  comedy  as  it  suited  his 
mood,  and  giving  himself  the  rest  and  refresh- 
ment which  come  from  change  of  work.  It  is 
certain  that  some  of  the  greater  Tragedies  were 
slowly  shaping  themselves  in  his  imagination 
from  the  earliest  working  years.  "  Romeo  and 
Juliet"  and  "Hamlet"  had  taken  root  in  his 
mind  while  he  was  yet  an  unknown  apprentice 
in  his  craft ;  during  these  fertile  years  the  germinal 
ideas  which  were  to  take  shape  in  the  entire  body 

248 


THE   COMEDIES 


249 


of  his  work  were  clarifying  themselves  in  his 
consciousness ;  while  his  hand  was  engaged  with 
one  subject  his  mind  was  dealing  with  many. 
He  had  already  used  the  comedy  form  in  "  The 
Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  "  The  Comedy  of 
Errors,"  and  "  Love's  Labour's  Lost,"  and  had 


GARDEN   OF   DR.   JOHN    HALL'S    HOUSE. 

made  it  clear  to  his  contemporaries  that  he  pos- 
sessed the  genius  of  comedy  —  that  rare,  pene- 
trating, radiant,  sane  genius  which  was  also  the 
possession  of  Homer  and  Cervantes,  and,  later, 
of  Moliere  and  Goethe  —  the  genius  which  not 
only  looks  into  human  experience  deeply,  but 
sees  it  broadly  and  in  true  perspective.  It  was 
Shakespeare's  ease  of  mind,  derived  from  the 


250  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

largeness  and  deep  humaneness  of  his  view, 
which  kept  him  sane  during  the  years  when  he 
was  living  in  the  heart  of  tragedy;  and  this  ease 
of  mind  found  expression  in  the  comedy.  The 
Shakespearian  comedy  is  a  comedy  of  life  rather 
than  of  manners  —  a  gay,  sweet,  high-spirited  play 
with  the  weaknesses,  follies,  incongruities  of  men 
as  these  are  projected  against  the  great  back- 
ground of  the  spiritual  kinship  and  destiny  of 
humanity.  There  is  no  touch  in  Shakespeare 
of  that  scorn  which  is  the  mood  of  those  lesser 
men  who  see  the  details  of  human  character  but 
not  the  totality  of  its  experience.  Shakespeare 
was  equally  at  home  with  the  tragic  and  comic 
elements  in  human  nature,  because  both  spring 
from  the  same  root.  In  dealing  with  the  tragic 
forces  he  is  always  superior  to  them ;  at  their  worst 
they  are  rigidly  limited  in  their  destructive  force ; 
he  is  not  the  victim  of  their  apparent  finality ;  he 
sees  through  and  beyond  them  to  the  immovable 
order  of  the  world,  as  one  sees  through  the  brief 
fury  of  the  storm  to  the  untouched  sun  and  un- 
moved earth  which  are  hidden  for  a  moment  by 
the  cloud.  In  like  manner  and  for  the  same  rea- 
son he  laughs  with  men,  but  is  saved  from  the 
cheapness  of  the  sneer  and  the  hard  blindness  of 
scorn.  In  his  wide,  clear,  dispassionate  vision  he 
sees  the  contrast  between  the  greatness  of  man's 
fortunes  and  the  occasional  littleness  of  his  aims, 
the  incongruities  of  his  occupations,  the  exaggera- 


THE   COMEDIES  251 

tions  and  eccentricities  of  his  manners.  He  is 
mirthful  because  he  loves  men ;  it  is  ,only  those 
who  love  us  who  can  really  laugh  at  and  with  us, 
and  it  is  only  men  of  great  heart  who  have  the  gift 
of  humour  on  a  great  scale.  For  humour,  Dr. 
Bushnell  says,  "  is  the  soul  reeking  with  its  own 
moisture,  laughing  because  it  is  full  of  laughter, 
as  ready  to  weep  as  to  laugh ;  for  the  copious 
shower  it  holds  is  good  for  either.  And  then, 
when  it  has  set  the  tree  a-dripping, 

"  And  hung  a  pearl  in  every  cowslip's  ear, 

the  pure  sun  shining  after  will  reveal  no  colour  of 
intention  in  the  sparkling  drop,  but  will  leave  you 
doubting  still  whether  it  be  a  drop  let  fall  by 
laughter  or  a  tear." 

Later  in  life,  for  a  brief  period,  Shakespeare's 
laughter  lost  its  ring  of  tenderness,  its  overflowing 
kindness ;  but  his  vision  became  clear  again,  and, 
although  the  spirit  of  mirth  never  regained  its 
ascendency,  the  old  sweetness  returned..  "Shake- 
speare is  a  well-spring  of  characters  which  are 
saturated  with  the  comic  spirit,"  writes  George 
Meredith ;  "  with  more  of  what  we  will  call  blood- 
life  than  is  to  be  found  anywhere  out  of  Shake- 
speare ;  and  they  are  of  this  world,  but  they  are  of 
the  world  enlarged  to  our  embrace  by  imagination, 
and  by  great  poetic  imagination.  They  are,  as  it 
were  —  I  put  it  to  suit  my  present  comparison  — 
creatures  of  the  woods  and  wilds,  not  in  walled 


252  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

towns,  not  grouped  and  toned  to  pursue  a  comic 
exhibition  of  the  narrower  world  of  society.  Jaques, 
Falstaff  and  his  regiment,  the  varied  troop  of 
Clowns,  Malvolio,  Sir  Hugh  Evans  and  Fluellen 
—  marvellous  Welshmen  !  —  Benedict  and  Beatrice, 
Dogberry  and  the  rest,  are  subjects  of  a  special 
study  in  the  poetically  comic." 

In  "  The  Merchant  of  Venice "  the  poet  finally 
emancipated  himself  from  the  influence  of  Marlowe, 
and  struck  his  own  note  with  perfect  distinctness. 
There  is  a  suggestion  of  the  "Jew  of  Malta "  in 
Shylock,  but  the  tragic  figure  about  whom  the 
play  moves  bears  on  every  feature  the  stamp  of 
Shakespeare's  humanizing  spirit.  The  embodiment 
of  his  race  and  the  product  of  centuries  of  cruel 
exclusion  from  the  larger  opportunities  of  life,  Shy- 
lock  appeals  to  us  the  more  deeply  because  he 
makes  us  feel  our  kinship  with  him.  Marlowe's 
Jew  is  a  monster;  Shakespeare's  Jew  is  a  man 
misshapen  by  the  hands  of  those  who  feed  his 
avarice. 

The  comedy  was  produced  about  1596;  it  was 
entered  in  the  Stationers'  Register  two  years  later, 
and  was  twice  published  in  1600.  The  dramatist 
drew  freely  upon  several  sources.  There  are  evi- 
dences of  the  existence  of  an  earlier  play ;  the  two 
stories  of  the  bond,  with  its  penalty  of  a  pound  of 
flesh,  and  of  the  three  caskets  were  already  known 
in  English  literature,  and  had  been  interwoven  to 
form  a  single  plot.  A  collection  of  Italian  novels 


THE    COMEDIES  253 

of  the  fourteenth  century  and  the  well-known 
"  Gesta  Romanorum  "  contributed  to  the  drama  as 
it  left  Shakespeare's  hands.  As  a  play,  it  has 
obvious  defects;  the  story  is  highly  improbable, 
and,  as  in  at  least  three  other  plays,  the  plot  in- 
volves bad  law ;  for  the  poet,  although  sharing  the 
familiarity  of  the  dramatists  generally  with  legal 
terms  and  phrases,  shows  that  his  knowledge  was 
second-hand,  or  acquired  for  the  occasion,  by  his 
misuse  of  well-known  words  of  legal  import.  In 
invention  in  the  matter  of  plots  and  situations 
Shakespeare  was  inferior  to  several  of  his  contem- 
poraries; and  he  was  content,  therefore,  to  take 
such  material  as  came  to  his  hand  with  as  much 
freedom  as  did  Moliere.  In  this  case,  as  in  every 
other,  he  at  once  put  his  private  mark  on  the 
general  property  and  made  it  his  own.  He  puri- 
fied the  material,  he  put  a  third  of  the  play  into 
prose,  and  he  imparted  to  the  verse  a  beauty,  a 
vigour,  and  a  freedom  from  mannerisms  which 
separate  it  at  once  from  work  of  the  apprentice 
period.  He  freely  and  boldly  harmonized  the 
tragic  and  comic  elements;  in  Portia  he  created 
the  first  of  those  enchanting  women  for  whom  no 
adjective  has  yet  been  found  save  the  word  Shake- 
spearian, for  they  are  a  group  by  themselves ;  and 
he  set  on  the  stage  the  first  of  his  great  tragic 
figures.  In  1596  the  Jew  was  contemptible  in  the 
mind  of  western  Europe;  he  was  the  personifica- 
tion of  greed  and  subtlety,  and  he  was  under  sus- 


254  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

picion  of  deeds  of  fiendish  cruelty.  He  was 
robbed  upon  the  slightest  pretext,  stoned  on  the 
streets,  and  jeered  at  on  the  stage.  His  sufferings 
were  food  for  mirth.  In  1594,  a  Jew,  who  was 
acting  as  physician  to  the  Queen,  had  been  accused 
of  attempting  to  poison  Elizabeth,  and  had  been 
hanged  at  Tyburn,  and  popular  hate  against  the 
race  was  at  fever-heat  when  Shakespeare  put  on 
the  stage  the  Jew  who  has  since  been  accepted  as 
typical  of  his  race.  It  is  not  probable  that  the 
dramatist  definitely  undertook  to  modify  the  popu- 
lar conception  of  the  Jew ;  his  attention  may  have 
been  directed  to  the  dramatic  possibilities  of  the 
character  by  the  trial  and  execution  of  Dr.  Lopez ; 
and  when  he  dealt  with  the  material  at  hand,  he 
recast  it  in  the  light  of  his  marvellous  imagination, 
and  humanized  the  central  figure.  Shylock  was  a 
new  type,  and  he  was  not  understood  at  first.  For 
many  years  the  part  was  played  in  a  spirit  of  broad 
and  boisterous  farce,  and  the  audiences  jeered  at 
the  lonely  and  tragic  figure.  At  every  point  in 
"  The  Merchant  of  Venice  "  the  poet  shows  clearer 
insight  than  in  his  earlier  work,  deeper  wisdom, 
greater  freedom  in  the  use  of  his  material,  and 
fuller  command  of  his  art. 

Shakespeare  had  an  older  play  before  him  when 
he  wrote  "  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  and  he 
followed  its  main  lines  of  story  so  closely  that  the 
play  as  we  now  have  it  is  an  adaptation  rather  than 
an  original  work.  That'the  dramatist  was  thinking 


THE   COMEDIES  255 

of  the  theatre  and  not  of  the  public  or  of  posterity  is 
shown  by  the  readiness  with  which  he  passed  from 
the  noblest  creative  work  to  the  work  of  revision 
and  adaptation.  The  earlier  play  gave  him  the 
idea  of  the  Induction  and  the  characteristic  passages 
between  Petruchio  and  Catharine,  but  was  an 
inferior  piece  of  work,  full  of  rant,  bathos,  and 
obvious  imitation  of  Marlowe  ;  the  plot  was  followed, 
but  the  construction  and  style  are  new ;  the  story 
of  Bianca  and  her  lovers  was  worked  in  as  a  sub- 
sidiary plot,  and,  although  the  play  sometimes 
passes  over  into  the  region  of  farce,  it  is  charged 
with  the  comedy  spirit. 

This  comedy  carries  the  reader  back  to  the  poet's 
youth,  to  Stratford  and  to  Warwickshire.  It  is  rich 
in  local  allusions,  as  are  also  "  The  Merry  Wives  of 
Windsor"  and  the  second  part  of  "Henry  IV." 
There  is  no  reason  to  doubt  that  Shakespeare's 
intercourse  with  Stratford  was  unbroken  through 
these  earlier  years,  though  the  difficulties  and 
expense  of  travel  may  have  prevented  frequent 
visits.  Now  that  prosperity  and  reputation  were 
bringing  him  ease  and  means,  his  relations  with  his 
old  home  became  more  intimate  and  active.  There 
are  many  evidences  of  his  interest  in  Stratford  and 
in  his  father's  affairs,  and  it  is  evident  that  the  son 
shared  his  rising  fortunes  with  his  father.  The 
latter  had  known  all  the  penalties  of  business  failure ; 
he  was  often  before  the  local  courts  as  a  debtor. 
He  seems  to  have  had  a  fondness  for  litigation, 


256  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

which  was  shared  by  his  son.  In  the  dramatist's 
time  the  knowledge  of  legal  phrases  among  intelli- 
gent men  outside  the  legal  profession  was  much 
more  general  than  it  has  been  at  any  later  time,  but 
there  is  reason  to  believe  that  Shakespeare  knew 
many  legal  processes  at  first  hand.  He  bought  and 
sold  land,  brought  various  actions  for  the  recovery 
of  debts,  filed  bills  in  chancery,  made  leases,  and 
was  engaged  in  a  number  of  litigations. 

In  1596,  after  an  absence  of  ten  years  from  Strat- 
ford, the  poet  reappears  in  his  native  place  as  a 
purchaser  of  valuable  lands  and  a  rebuilder  of  his 
father's  shattered  fortune.  In  that  year  his  only 
son,  Hamnet,  a  boy  of  eleven,  died  and  was  buried 
in  Holy  Trinity  Churchyard.  In  the  same  year 
John  Shakespeare  made  application  to  the  College 
of  Heralds  for  the  privilege  of  using  a  coat  of  arms. 
The  claim  was  based  on  certain  services  which  the 
ancestors  of  the  claimant  were  declared  to  have  ren- 
dered "  the  most  prudent  prince  King  Henry  the 
Seventh  of  famous  memorie."  The  ancestral  distinc- 
tion put  forward  on  behalf  of  John  Shakespeare  was 
not  more  apocryphal  than  the  services  set  forth  in 
many  similar  romances  formally  presented  to  the 
College  of  Arms  as  records  of  fact.  The  statement 
that  the  applicant's  wife,  Mary,  heiress  of  Robert 
Arden,  of  Wilmcote,  was  the  daughter  of  a  gentle- 
man has  not  been  verified.  The  application  was 
granted  three  years  later,  and  the  Garter  King  of 
Arms  assigned  to  John  Shakespeare  a  shield:  "gold, 


THE   COMEDIES  257 

on  a  bend  sable,  a  spear  of  the  first,  and  for  his 
crest  or  cognizance  a  falcon,  his  wings  displayed 
argent,  standing  on  a  wreath  of  his  colours,  sup- 
porting a  spear  gold  steeled  as  aforesaid."  The 
motto,  "  Non  Sans  Droict,"  appears  in  a  sketch  or 
draft  of  the  crest.  Two  years  later  the  dramatist 
was  styled  "  gentleman "  in  a  legal  document. 

This  effort  to  rehabilitate  his  father  was  followed, 
a  year  later,  by  the  purchase  of  New  Place  —  a  con- 
spicuous property  at  the  northeast  corner  of  Chapel 
Street  and  Chapel  Lane,  opposite  the  Guild  Chapel, 
in  Stratford,  upon  which  stood  what  was  probably 
the  largest  house  in  the  town.  This  substantial 
house,  built  of  timber  and  brick  by  Sir  Hugh  Clop- 
ton  in  the  previous  century,  had  probably  been 
long  neglected,  and  was  fast  going  to  decay. 

No  clear  account  of  the  appearance  of  the  house 
has  been  preserved  ;  but  enough  remains  to  show 
its  considerable  size  and  substantial  structure. 
The  walls  of  the  larger  rooms  and  probably  the 
ceilings  were  covered  with  sunken  panels  of  oak, 
some  of  which  have  been  preserved.  Nothing  else 
now  remains  of  the  building  save  a  few  timbers 
which  projected  into  the  adjoining  house,  now  used 
as  a  residence  for  the  custodian  of  the  Shakespeare 
properties,  a  fragment  of  the  north  wall,  the  well, 
pieces  of  the  foundation,  which  are  guarded  by 
screens,  the  lintel,  and  an  armorial  stone. 

Shakespeare  restored  New  Place,  and  enlarged 
its  grounds  by  considerable  purchases  of  land.  At 


258 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


his  death  it  passed  into  the  possession  of  his  daugh- 
ter, Susannah,  the  wife  of  Dr.  John  Hall,  and  in 
July,  1643,  Queen  Henrietta  Maria  was  entertained 
for  three  days  under  its  roof.  Upon  the  death  of 
Mrs.  Hall,  six  years  later,  New  Place  became  the 
property  of  her  only  child,  Elizabeth,  at  that  time 


DR.   JOHN    HALL'S    HOUSE  AT   STRATFORD. 


the  wife  of  Thomas  Nashe,  later  the  wife  of  Sir 
John  Barnard,  of  Abingdon.  Lady  Barnard  was 
the  last  of  Shakespeare's  direct  descendants. 

At  a  later  period  the  property  came  once  more 
into  the  hands  of  the  Clopton  family,  and  was  sub- 
sequently sold  to  the  Rev.  Francis  Gastrell,  a  vicar 
in  Cheshire,  who  appears  to  have  been  a  person  of 
considerable  fortune,  dull  perception,  and  irritable 


THE   COMEDIES  259 

temper.  He  resented  the  interest  which  visitors 
were  beginning  to  show  in  the  place ;  in  order  to 
break  up  the  growing  habit  of  sitting  under  the 
mulberry  tree,  which  was  intimately  associated  with 
the  dramatist,  he  cut  the  tree  to  the  ground  in  1756. 
This  attitude  towards  the  one  great  tradition  of  the 
town  brought  the  owner  of  New  Place  into  a  disfa- 
vour with  his  fellow-townsmen  which  took  on  aggres- 
sive forms.  The  Stratford  officials  charged  with 
the  laying  and  collection  of  taxes  made  use  of  their 
power  to  secure  the  utmost  farthing  from  Mr.  Gas- 
trell,  and  that  gentleman,  in  order  to  relieve  himself 
of  further  taxes,  pulled  down  the  house,  sold  the 
materials,  and  left  Stratford  amid  execrations  which 
have  been  echoed  in  every  succeeding  generation. 
The  house  adjoining  New  Place  was  the  property 
of  one  of  the  poet's  friends,  and  now  serves  as  a 
residence  for  the  custodian  and  as  a  museum  of 
Shakespearian  relics.  The  adjoining  house  was 
the  home  of  Shakespeare's  friend,  Julius  Shaw,  who 
was  one  of  the  witnesses  to  his  will ;  and,  after 
various  changes,  it  is  still  standing.  New  Place  is 
to-day  a  green  and  fragrant  garden ;  the  fragments 
of  the  original  foundation  are  infolded  in  a  lawn  of 
velvet-like  texture;  the  mulberry  tree  has  survived 
the  vandalism  of  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago ; 
behind  the  old  site  there  is  a  small  but  perfectly 
kept  park  where  many  flowers  of  Shakespearian 
association  may  be  found,  where  the  air  seems 
always  fragrant  and  the  place  touched  with  abiding 


260  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

peace.  The  tower  of  Guild  Chapel  rises  close  at 
hand;  in  the  near  distance  is  the  spire  of  Holy 
Trinity;  the  Avon  is  almost  within  sight;  the 
earlier  and  the  later  associations  of  Shakespeare's 
life  cluster  about  the  place  which  he  saw  every  day 
as  a  schoolboy,  to  which  he  returned  in  his  prime, 
where  he  gathered  his  friends  about  him,  and 
where  he  found  reconciliation  and,  at  last,  peace. 

The  purchase  and  restoration  of  New  Place 
made  Shakespeare  a  man  of  consequence  among 
neighbours  who  could  understand  the  value  of 
property,  however  they  might  miss  the  signifi- 
cance of  literature.  In  a  letter,  still  extant,  dated 
October  25,  1598,  Richard  Ouiney,  whose  son 
Thomas  subsequently  married  Judith  Shakespeare, 
appealed  to  the  poet  for  a  loan ;  and  there  are 
other  evidences  that  he  was  regarded  as  a  man 
whose  income  afforded  a  margin  beyond  his  own 
needs. 

The  poet's  acquaintance  with  country  life  in  its 
humblest  forms ;  with  rural  speech,  customs,  and 
festivals;  with  sports  and  games;  with  village 
taverns  and  their  frequenters,  was  so  intimate 
and  extensive  that  he  used  it  with  unconscious 
freedom  and  ease.  No  other  contemporary  drama- 
tist shows  the  same  familiarity  with  manners, 
habits,  and  people ;  an  intimacy  which  must  have 
been  formed  by  a  boy  who  made  his  first  acquaint- 
ance with  life  in  Warwickshire.  These  reminis- 
cences of  boyhood,  reenforced  by  the  later  and 


THE   COMEDIES  26 1 

deliberate  attention  of  a  trained  observer,  con- 
tinually crop  out  in  many  of  the  plays,  as  the 
formations  of  an  earlier  geologic  period  often  show 
themselves  through  the  structure  of  a  later  period. 
The  fertility  of  resource  which  gives  the  two 
parts  of  "  Henry  IV."  such  overflowing  vitality 
made  the  writing  of  "  The  Merry  Wives  of  Wind- 
sor" inevitable.  It  was  quite  impossible  for  the 


GREENWICH   PALACE. 


dramatist  to  leave  a  character  so  rich  in  the 
elements  of  comedy  as  Falstaff  without  further 
development  under  wholly  different  conditions. 
In  the  Epilogue  to  "  Henry  IV."  the  dramatist 
promised  to  "  continue  the  story  with  Sir  John 
in  it,  and  make  you  merry  with  fair  Katharine 
of  France";  but  "Henry  V."  contained  no  refer- 
ence to  the  old  knight  save  the  brief  but  inimitable 
account  of  his  death.  Almost  a  century  after  the 
death  of  the  Queen  three  writers  reported  almost 


262  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

simultaneously    the     tradition,    apparently    current 
at    the    time  and    probably  of   long  standing,  that 
Elizabeth  was    so   delighted   with    the    humour  of 
Falstaff    in    "  Henry    IV."    that    she    commanded 
Shakespeare     to     continue     the     story   and    show 
Falstaff    in     love.      "  I     knew    very    well,"    wrote 
Dennis,  by  way  of   introducing   an    adaptation    of 
the  play  in    1702,  "that  it  had  pleas'd  one  of  the 
greatest  queens   that  ever  was   in    the  world.  .  .  . 
This  comedy  was  written  at  her  command  and  by 
her  direction,  and  she  was  so  eager  to  see  it  acted 
that  she  commanded  it  to  be  finished  in  fourteen 
days."     Seven  years  later  Rowe  added  the  further 
information  that  "  she  was  so  well  pleased  with  the 
admirable  character  of    Falstaff   in  the    two    parts 
of    '  Henry  IV.'  that  she  commanded  him  to  con- 
tinue it  for  one    play  more,  and    to    show  him    in 
love."       The    tradition    apparently   has    been    long 
accepted,  and  there   are   intrinsic   evidences  which 
make    it  credible.     "  The    Merry   Wives   of    Wind- 
sor" is   the  kind  of  play  which   such  a  command 
would   have  secured.     It   is   a  comedy  which  con- 
tinually runs  into  broad  farce ;    there  is  no  touch 
of   pathos    in    it;    it   deals   with   contemporaneous 
middle-class  people,  in  whom  the  dramatist  shows 
very  little  interest ;    it  is  laid  in  Windsor,  and  con- 
tains   references    to    the   castle    which    must    have 
been  very  acceptable  to  the  Queen.     The  ground 
was    evidently  familiar  to  the  dramatist,  and  there 
are    references    of   a   realistic   character,    not   only 


THE   COMEDIES  263 

to  Windsor,  but  to  Stratford.  Moreover,  the  play, 
although  admirable  in  construction,  is  below  the 
level  of  Shakespeare's  work  of  this  period  in  intel- 
lectual quality,  and  lacks  those  inimitable  touches 
of  humour  and  poetry  which  are  the  ineffaceable 
marks  of  his  genius  when  it  is  working  freely  and 
spontaneously. 

The  play  owes  little  in  the  way  of  direct  con- 
tribution to  earlier  sources,  though  various  inci- 
dents used  in  it  are  to  be  found  in  Italian  and 
other  stories.  It  was  probably  written  about 
1599,  and  the  Queen,  according  to  tradition,  was 
"  very  well  pleased  with  the  representation."  The 
plot  is  essentially  Italian ;  the  introduction  of  the 
fairies  was  a  revival  of  the  masque  ;  but  the  atmos- 
phere of  the  play  is  entirely  English ;  it  reflects 
the  hearty,  healthy,  bluff  spirit  and  manner  of 
middle-class  life  in  an  English  village.  It  is  the 
only  play  dealing  with  the  English  life  of  his  own 
time  which  Shakespeare  wrote,  and  it  undoubtedly 
reproduces  conditions,  manners,  and  habits  which 
he  had  known  at  first  hand  in  Stratford.  Fal- 
staff  shows  a  great  decline  in  spontaneity,  fresh- 
ness, and  humour;  he  has  become  gross,  heavy, 
and  dull ;  he  easily  falls  a  victim  to  very  obvious 
devices  against  his  dignity;  he  has  sunk  so  low 
that  he  has  become  the  butt  of  practical  jokers. 
It  is  probable  that  this  particular  development 
of  Falstaff  was  suggested  to  Shakespeare  by 
Elizabeth  rather  than  forced  upon  him  by  the 


264  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

expansive  vitality  of  the  character.  As  a  whole 
the  play  shows  breadth  of  characterization  and 
genuine  humour,  while  Windsor  and  the  country 
about  it  are  sketched  with  unusual  fidelity  to 
detail,  but  with  characteristic  freshness  of  feeling 
for  fields  and  woods. 

This  homely  comedy  of  middle-class  English 
country  life,  with  its  boisterous  fun,  its  broad  hu- 
mour, and  its  realistic  descriptive  passages,  was 
probably  written  not  long  before  "  Much  Ado 
About  Nothing,"  but  the  two  plays  present  the 
most  striking  contrasts  of  method  and  manner.  The 
Italian  play  is  in  an  entirely  different  key;  it  is 
brilliant,  spirited,  charged  with  vivacity,  and  spar- 
kling with  wit ;  it  is  a  masterpiece  of  keen  character- 
ization, of  flashing  conversation,  of  striking  contrasts 
of  type,  and  of  intellectual  energy,  playing  freely 
and  buoyantly  against  a  background  of  exquisite 
beauty.  The  dramatist  was  now  completely  eman- 
cipated from  his  earlier  teachers,  and  had  secured 
entire  command  of  his  own  genius  and  of  the  re- 
sources of  comedy  as  a  literary  form.  In  this 
splendid  creation  of  his  happiest  mood  in  his  most 
fortunate  years,  the  prophecy  of  sustained  and  flash- 
ing interchange  of  wit  in  Lyly's  court  plays  is  am- 
ply fulfilled,  and  the  promise  of  individual  power  of 
characterization  clearly  discerned  in  Biron  and 
Rosaline  is  perfectly  realized  in  Benedict  and  Bea- 
trice ;  while  Dogberry  and  Verges  mark  the  perfec- 
tion of  Shakespeare's  skill  in  drawing  blundering 


THE   COMEDIES  265 

clowns.  In  this  play  the  blending  of  the  tragic  and 
humorous  or  comic  is  so  happily  accomplished  that 
the  two  contrasting  elements  flow  together  in  a  vital 
and  exquisite  harmony  of  experience,  full  of  tender- 
ness, loyalty,  audacity,  and  brilliancy ;  the  most  com- 
prehensive contrast  of  character  is  secured  in  Hero 
and  Claudio,  Benedict  and  Beatrice,  as  chief  actors 
in  the  drama,  with  Dogberry  and  Verges  as  centres 
of  interest  in  the  minor  or  subsidiary  plot.  Hazlitt 
declares  with  reference  to  this  play  that  perhaps 
"  the  middle  point  of  comedy  was  never  more  nicely 
hit,  in  which  the  ludicrous  blends  with  the  tender, 
and  our  follies,  turning  round  against  themselves  in 
support  of  our  affections,  retain  nothing  but  their 
humanity."  In  "The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor" 
Shakespeare  drew  with  a  free  hand  the  large  and 
rather  coarse  qualities  of  English  middle-class  life ; 
in  "  Much  Ado  About  Nothing "  he  presented  a 
study  of  life  in  the  highest  stage  of  the  social  order, 
touched  at  all  points  with  distinction  of  insight, 
characterization,  and  taste.  The  gayety  and  brill- 
iancy of  the  great  world  as  contrasted  with  the  little 
world  of  rural  and  provincial  society  are  expressed 
with  a  confidence  and  consistency  which  indicate 
that  the  poet  must  have  known  something  of  the 
court  circle  and  of  the  accomplished  women  who 
moved  in  it. 

Written  probably  about  1599,  and  drawing  appar- 
ently for  some  features  of  the  plot  and  comic  inci- 
dents upon  the  inexhaustible  Bandello  and  upon  one 


266  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

of  the  greatest  works  of  Italian  genius,  the  "  Orlando 
Furioso"  of  Ariosto,  "  Much  Ado  About  Nothing" 
marks  the  highest  point  of  Shakespeare's  creative 
activity  in  comedy,  and  perhaps  the  most  brilliant 
and  prosperous  hour  in  this  prolific  and  fortunate 
period  of  his  life. 

In  the  same  year  Shakespeare  created  his  master- 
piece of  poetic  pastoral  drama,  "  As  Yon  T  ikp  Tiv" 
He  was  still  in  the  sunlight,  but  the  shadows  were 
approaching ;  his  mood  was  still  gay  and  his  spirits 
buoyant,  but  the  one  was  touched  with  premonitions 
of  sadness  and  the  other  tempered  by  a  deepening 
sense  of  the  complexity  of  life  and  its  mystery  of 
good  and  evil.  In  the  form  and  background  of  the 
play  he  was  in  touch  with  the  love  of  pastoral  life 
shared  by  many  of  the  poets  of  his  time ;  by  Lodge 
and  Greene,  by  Spenser  and  Sidney.  The  Arcadia 
of  literature  was  in  his  imagination,  but  the  deep 
shadows  and  wide  spaces  of  the  Forest  of  Arden  in 
Warwickshire  were  before  his  eye;  he  knew  the 
affected  passion  for  flowering  meads  and  gentle 
shepherds  which  were  the  stock-in-trade  of  many 
contemporaries,  but  he  also  felt  that  fresh  and  un- 
forced delight  in  nature  which  brings  him  in  touch 
with  the  modern  poets.  He  knew  how  to  use  the 
conventional  poetic  speech  about  nature,  but  he  saw 
nature  with  his  own  eyes  as  clearly  as  Burns  and 
Wordsworth  saw  her  two  centuries  later.  The  plot 
of  "  As  You  Like  It "  was  probably  taken  from 
Lodge's  "  Rosalynde,  Euphues'  Golden  Legacie," 


THE  COMEDIES  267 

an  old-fashioned,  artificial,  pastoral  romance,  full  of 
affectations  and  unrealities,  based  upon  the  much 
older  "  Tale  of  Gamelyn,"  which  appeared  in  the 
fourteenth  century  and  was  handed  down  in  several 
manuscripts  of  Chaucer's  "  Canterbury  Tales,"  and 
was  probably  intended  for  use  in  a  tale  which  the 
poet  left  unwritten.  This  old  story  belongs  to  the 
cycle  of  the  Robin  Hood  ballads ;  and  Shakespeare 
had  this  origin  of  the  story  in  mind  when  he  wrote : 
"  They  say  he  is  already  in  the  Forest  of  Arden,  and 
a  many  merry  men  with  him ;  and  there  they  live 
like  the  old  Robin  Hood  of  England." 

The  woodland  world  of  Arden,  in  which  sonnets 
are  affixed  to  ancient  trees,  and  lovers,  courtiers,  and 
moralists  live  at  ease,  has  much  in  common  with 
the  pastoral  backgrounds  of  Spenser  and  Lodge ; 
but  its  artificiality  is  redeemed  by  its  freshness  of 
spirit,  its  out-of-door  freedom,  and  its  enchanting 
society.  Rosalind  and  Orlando  are  the  successors 
of  a  long  line  of  pastoral  lovers,  but  they,  alone 
among  their  kind,  really  live.  In  Rosalind  purity, 
passion,  and  freedom  are  harmonized  in  one  of  the 
most  enchanting  women  in  literature.  In  her 
speech  love  finds  a  new  language,  which  is  continu- 
ally saved  from  extravagance  by  its  vivacity  and 
humour.  In  Audrey  and  Corin  the  passion  of 
Orlando  and  Rosalind  is  gently  parodied;  in 
Touchstone  the  melancholy  humour  of  Jaques  is 
set  out  in  more  effective  relief.  There  are  threaten- 
ings  of  tragedy  in  the  beginning  of  the  play,  but 


268  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

they  are  dissolved  in  an  air  in  which  purity  and 
truth  and  health  serve  to  resolve  the  baser  designs 
of  men  into  harmless  fantasies.  In  Jaques,  how- 
ever, there  appears  for  the  first  time  the  student  of 
his  kind  who  has  pierced  the  illusions  of  place  and 
power  and  passion,  and  touched  the  underlying 
contradiction  between  the  greatness  of  man's  desires 
and  the  uncertainty  and  inadequacy  of  his  achieve- 
ments. This  sadness  is  touched  with  a  not  unkindly 
irony ;  for  Shakespeare's  vision  was  so  wide  that  he 
was  rarely  able  to  look  at  life  from  a  single  point ; 
its  magnitude,  its  complexity,  the  rigour  of  its  law, 
and  at  the  same  time  the  apparent  caprice  with 
which  its  diverse  fortunes  were  bestowed,  were 
always  within  his  view.  At  the  best,  we  seem  to 
hear  him  say  in  this  mood : 

All  the  world's  a  stage, 
And  all  the  men  and  women  merely  players. 

Jaques  must  not  be  taken  too  seriously,  but 
there  are  hints  of  Hamlet's  mood  in  his  brooding 
meditation ;  and  through  the  whole  play  there  is  a 
vein  of  sadness  which,  mingled  with  its  gayety  and 
poetic  loveliness,  gives  it  a  deep  and  searching 
beauty. 

In    the    Christmas     season    of    1601    "  Twelfth^ 

Night "  was  presented  in  the  noble  hall  of  the  Middle 

Temple.     "At  our  feast," writes  John  Manningham, 

a  member,  in  his  diary,    "  we   had    a    play  called 

Twelfth  Night;  or,  What  You  Will.'     Much  like 


THE  COMEDIES  269 

the  *  Comedy  of  Errors  '  or  '  Menaechmi '  in  Plautus ; 
but  most  like  and  near  to  that  in  Italian  called 
'  Inganni.'  A  good  practise  in  it  to  make  the 
steward  believe  his  lady  widowe  was  in  love  with 
him,  by  counterfeiting  as  from  his  lady  in  general 


THE   HALL   OF   THE    MIDDLE  TEMPLE. 
Where  "  Twelfth  Night"  was  played. 


terms,  telling  him  what  she  liked  best  in  him,  and 
prescribing  his  gesture  in  smiling,  his  apparel,  etc., 
and  then  when  he  came  to  practise  making  him 
believe  they  took  him  to  be  mad."  This  charming 
comedy,  so  characteristic  of  Shakespeare's  genius 


270  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

at  play,  was  probably  acted  by  the  Lord  Chamber- 
lain's servants,  the  company  with  which  Shake- 
speare was  associated,  before  the  Court  in  the  old 
palace  at  Whitehall  during  the  same  season. 

The  ultimate  source  of  the  play  was  probably 
Bandello's  "  Novelle,"  though  the  Italian  plays  to 
which  Manningham  refers  (there  were  several  plays 
with  the  title  Inganni)  may  have  furnished  incidents  ; 
but  Malvolio,  Sir  Toby  Belch,  Sir  Andrew  Ague- 
cheek,  Maria,  and,  above  all,  Viola,  as  they  live  in 
the  comedy  are  Shakespearian  to  the  heart.  The 
framework  of  the  play  is  essentially  serious,  a 
beautiful  vein  of  poetic  feeling  runs  through  it,  and, 
intermingled  with  these,  the  most  unforced  and 
uproarious  fun.  In  inventiveness  in  the  comic 
type  and  in  freedom  in  handling  it,  as  well  as  in 
grouping  of  diverse  materials  and  fusing  them  into 
a  harmonious  and  captivating  whole,  this  comedy 
was  never  surpassed  by  the  dramatist.  He  parted 
with  the  muse  of  comedy  at  the  very  moment  when 
he  had  mastered  the  art  of  touching  the  weaknesses, 
follies,  and  minor  sins  of  men  with  a  touch  which 
was  keen  with  the  wisdom  of  a  great  knowledge  of 
the  world,  and  gentle  with  the  kindness  of  one  who 
loved  his  kind  for  what  they  had  lost  rather  than 
for  what  they  had  won. 


CHAPTER   XII 

THE   APPROACH    OF   TRAGEDY 

WITH  the  advent  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
Shakespeare  entered  the  greatest  period  of  his  life 
as  an  artist  —  the  period  of  the  Tragedies.  During 
eight  eventful  years  he  was  brooding  over  the  deep- 
est problems  of  human  experience,  and  facing,  with 
searching  and  unfaltering  gaze,  the  darkest  aspects 
of  life.  That  this  absorption  in  themes  which  bore 
their  fruit  in  the  Tragedies  was  due  primarily  to  a 
prolonged  crisis  in  his  own  spiritual  life  is  rendered 
practically  certain  by  the  persistence  of  the  sombre 
mood,  by  the  poet's  evident  sensitiveness  to  and 
dependence  upon  conditions  and  experience,  and 
by  a  series  of  facts  of  tragical  import  in  the  lives  of 
some  of  his  friends.  His  development  in  thought 
and  art  was  so  evidently  one  of  definite  progression, 
of  the  deepening  of  feeling  and  broadening  of  vision 
through  the  unfolding  of  his  nature,  that  it  is  impos- 
sible to  dissociate  the  marked  change  of  mood  which 
came  over  him  about  1 600  from  events  which  touched 
and  searched  his  own  spirit. 

Until  about  1595  Shakespeare  had  been  serving 
his  apprenticeship  by  doing  work  which  was  to  a 
considerable  extent  imitative,  and  to  a  larger  extent 

271 


272 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


experimental ;  he  had  tried  his  hand  at  several  kinds 
of  writing,  and  had  revealed  unusual  power  of  ob- 


THE   SHAKESPEARE   MONUMENT   IN   TRINITY   CHURCH,    STRATFORD. 

servation,  astonishing  dexterity  of  mind,  and  signal 
skill  in  making  the  traditional  characters  of  the 
drama  live  before  the  eyes  and  in  the  imagination 


THE   APPROACH    OF   TRAGEDY  273 

of  the  theatre-goers  who  made  up  his  earliest  con- 
stituency. From  about  1594  to  1600  he  had  grown 
into  harmonious  and  vital  relations  with  his  age,  he 
had  disclosed  poetic  genius  of  a  very  high  order, 
and  he.  had  gone  far  in  his  education  as  a  dramatist. 
He  had  written  the  Sonnets,  and  he  had  created 
Portia,  Beatrice,  Rosalind,  Juliet,  Romeo,  Mercutio, 
Benedict,  Henry  V.,  Falstaff,  Shylock,  Hotspur,  and 
Dogberry.  If  he  had  died  in  1600,  his  place  would 
have  been  secure.  His  reputation  was  firmly  estab- 
lished, and  he  had  won  the  hearts  of  his  contempo- 
raries by  the  charm  of  his  nature  no  less  than  by  the 
fascination  of  his  genius. 

His  serenity,  poise,  and  sweetness  are  evidenced 
not  only  by  his  work  but  by  the  representations  of 
his  face  which  remain.  Of  these  the  bust  in  the 
chancel  of  Holy  Trinity  Church  at  Stratford,  made 
by  Gerard  Jonson,  a  native  of  Amsterdam,  and  a 
stone-mason  of  Southwark  in  the  poet's  time,  and 
the  Droeshout  portrait,  which  appeared  on  the  title- 
page  of  the  First  Folio  edition  of  the  poet's  works, 
issued  in  1623,  were  accepted  by  his  friends  and 
contemporaries,  and  must  present  at  least  a  general 
resemblance  to  the  poet's  features.  They  are  so 
crude  in  execution  that  they  cannot  do  justice  to 
the  finer  lines  of  structure  or  to  the  delicacy  of 
colouring  of  Shakespeare's  face  and  head,  but  they 
make  the  type  sufficiently  clear.  They  represent  a 
face  of  singular  harmony  and  regularity  of  feature, 
crowned  by  a  noble  and  finely  proportioned  head. 


274  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

The  eyes  were  hazel  in  colour,  the  hair  auburn  ;  the 
expression,  deeply  meditative  and  kindly,  was  that 
of  a  man  of  thoughtful  temper,  genial  nature,  and 
thorough  self-control.  In  figure  Shakespeare  was 
of  medium  stature  and  compactly  built. 

It  is  significant  that,  after  the  first  outburst  of 
jealousy  of  the  young  dramatist's  growing  popu- 
larity in  Greene's  "  A  Groatsworth  of  Wit  Bought 
with  a  Million  of  Repentance,"  the  expressions 
of  Shakespeare's  contemporaries  indicate  unusual 
warmth  of  personal  regard,  culminating  in  a  mag- 
nificent eulogy  from  his  greatest  rival,  and  one  who 
had  reason  to  fear  him  most. 

That  he  was  of  a  social  disposition,  and  met  men 
easily  and  on  pleasant  terms,  is  evident  from  the 
extraordinary  range  of  his  knowledge  of  men  and 
manners  in  the  taverns  of  his  time  —  those  prede- 
cessors of  the  modern  club.  That  he  enjoyed  the 
society  of  men  of  his  own  craft  is  evident  both  from 
his  own  disposition  and  from  the  fact  that  he  stood 
so  distinctly  outside  the  literary  and  theatrical 
quarrels  of  his  time.  The  tradition  which  asso- 
ciates him  with  the  Mermaid  Tavern  which  stood 
in  Bread  Street,  not  far  from  Milton's  birthplace,  is 
entirely  credible.  There  he  would  have  found  many 
of  the  most  brilliant  men  of  his  time.  Beaumont's 
well-known  description  inclines  one  to  believe  that 
under  no  roof  in  England  has  better  talk  been  heard : 

What  things  have  we  seen 
Done  at  the  Mermaid  ?  heard  words  that  have  been 


THE   APPROACH   OF   TRAGEDY  275 

So  nimble  and  so  full  of  subtle  flame, 
As  if  that  every  one  from  whence  they  came 
Had  meant  to  put  his  whole  wit  in  a  jest, 
And  had  resolved  to  live  a  fool  the  rest 
Of  his  dull  life. 


The  age  was  eminently  social  in  instinct  and 
habit ;  society,  in  the  modern  sense  of  the  word, 
was  taking  shape ;  and  men  found  great  attraction 
in  the  easy  intercourse  and  frank  speech  of  tavern 
meetings.  Writing  much  later,  but  undoubtedly 
reporting  the  impression  of  Shakespeare's  contem- 
poraries, Thomas  Fuller  says,  in  his  "  Worthies  " : 
"  Which  two  I  beheld  like  a  Spanish  great  gallion 
and  an  English  man-of-war:  Master  Jonson  (like 
the  former)  was  built  far  higher  up  in  learning; 
solid,  but  slow  in  his  performances.  Shake-spear, 
with  the  English  man-of-war,  lesser  in  bulk,  but 
lighter  in  sailing,  could  turn  with  all  tides,  tack 
about,  and  take  advantage  of  all  winds,  by  the 
quickness  of  his  wit  and  invention." 

At  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century  Shakespeare 
was  on  the  flood-tide  of  a  prosperous  life ;  at  the 
very  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century  a  deep 
and  significant  change  came  over  his  spirit.  In 
external  affairs  his  fortunes  rose  steadily  until  his 
death ;  but  in  his  spiritual  life  momentous  expe- 
riences changed  for  a  time  the  current  of  his 
thought,  and  clouded  the  serene  skies  in  the  light 
of  which  nature  had  been  so  radiant  and  life  so 
absorbingly  interesting  to  him.  While  it  is  highly 


276  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

improbable  that  the  Sonnets  record  in  chrono- 
logical order  two  deep  and  searching  emotional 
experiences,  the  autobiographic  note  in  them  is  un- 
mistakable ;  it  is  impossible  to  avoid  the  conclusion 
that  they  express,  if  they  do  not  literally  report,  a 
prolonged  emotional  experience  culminating  in  a 
crisis  which  shook  the  very  bases  of  his  nature ; 
which  brought  him  in  the  beginning  an  intense 
and  passionate  joy,  slowly  dissolving  into  a  great 
and  bitter  agony  of  spirit;  and  issuing  at  last, 
through  the  moralization  of  a  searching  insight, 
in  a  larger  and  deeper  harmony  with  the  order  of 
life.  This  experience,  in  which  friendship  and  love 
contended  for  supremacy  in  his  soul ;  in  which  he 
entered  into  a  new  and  humiliating  consciousness 
of  weakness  in  his  own  spirit,  and  in  which  he  knew, 
apparently  for  the  first  time,  that  bitterness  of  dis- 
enchantment and  disillusion  which  to  a  nature  of 
such  sensitiveness  and  emotional  capacity  as  his 
is  the  bitterest  cup  ever  held  to  the  lips,  found  him 
gay,  light-hearted,  buoyant,  full  of  creative  energy, 
and  radiant  with  the  charm  and  the  dreams  of 
youth ;  it  left  him  saddened  in  spirit,  burdened 
with  the  consciousness  of  weakness,  face  to  face 
with  those  tragic  collisions  which  seem  at  times 
to  disclose  the  play  of  the  irony  of  fate,  but  out 
of  which,  in  agony  and  apparent  defeat,  the  larger 
and  more  inclusive  harmony  of  the  individual  with 
the  divine  and  the  human  order  of  society  is  secured 
and  disclosed. 


THE   APPROACH    OF   TRAGEDY  277 

Shakespeare  drank  deep  of  the  cup  of  suffering 
before  he  set  in  the  order  of  art,  with  a  hand  at 
once  stern  and  tender,  the  colossal  sorrows  of  his 
kind.  Like  all  artists  of  the  deepest  insight,  the 
keenest  sensitiveness  to  beauty,  and  that  subtle  and 
elusive  but  magical  spiritual  sympathy  which  we 
call  genius,  which  puts  its  possessor  in  command 
of  the  secret  experience  of  his  kind,  Shakespeare's 
art  waited  upon  his  experience  for  its  full  capacity 
of  thought  and  feeling,  and  touched  its  highest 
points  of  achievement  only  when  his  own  spirit 
had  sounded  the  depths  of  self-knowledge  and  of 
self-surrender.  In  the  great  Tragedies  life  and  art 
are  so  completely  merged  that  they  are  no  longer 
separable  in  thought;  these  dramas  disclose  the 
ultimate  harmony  between  spirit  and  form. 

This  searching  inward  experience  was  contempo- 
raneous in  Shakespeare's  life  at  the  beginning  of 
the  seventeenth  century  with  fierce  dissensions  be- 
tween his  personal  friends  in  his  own  profession, 
with  growing  bitterness  of  feeling  and  sharper  antag- 
onism between  the  two  great  parties  in  England, 
and  with  a  gradual  but  unmistakable  overshadowing 
of  the  splendours  of  the  "  spacious  days  of  great 
Elizabeth."  What  is  known  as  "  The  War  of 
the  Theatres"  was  at  its  height  between  1598  and 
1602;  the  chief  combatants  being  Ben  Jonson  on 
one  side,  and  Dekker  and  Marston  on  the  other; 
the  weapons  of  warfare,  satirical  plays.  Thirteen 
or  fourteen  dramas  are  enumerated  as  having  their 


WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 


origin  in  the  antagonism  between  the  rival  play- 
wrights, the  best  known  and  most  important  of  these 
plays  being  Jonson's  striking  and  characteristic 
comedy  "  Every  Man  in  His  Humour,"  and  his 
"  Poetaster."  Dekker's  "  Satiromastrix  "  and  Mars- 
ton's  "  What 
You  Will  "are 
chiefly  inter- 
esting as  form- 
ing part  of  the 
record  of  this 
vociferous  war, 
and  "  The  Re- 
turn from  Par- 
n  a  s  s  u  s  "  on 
account  of  one 
interesting  but 
obscure  refer- 
ence to  Shake- 
speare which 
it  contains: 
"Few  of  the 
University  pen 
plaies  well,  they  smell  too  much  of  that  writer  Ovid, 
and  that  writer  Metamorphosis,  and  talke  too  much 
of  Proserpina  and  Juppiter.  Why,  heres  our  fellow 
Shakespeare  puts  them  all  downe,  I  and  Ben  Jonson 
too.  O,  that  Ben  Jonson  is  a  pestilent  fellow,  he 
brought  up  Horace  giving  the  Poets  a  pill,  but 
our  fellow  Shakespeare  hath  given  him  a  purge 


BEN   JONSON. 
From  a  picture  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Knight. 


THE   APPROACH   OF  TRAGEDY  279 

that  made  him  beray  his  credit."  These  words 
were  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  actor  Kempe  and 
spoken  to  the  well-known  actor  Burbage,  and  Mr. 
Ward  suggests  that  their  meaning  may  be  put  into 
plain  speech :  "  Our  fellow,  Shakespeare,  ay,  and 
Ben  Jonson,  too,  puts  down  all  the  university  play- 
writers." 

The  reference  to  a  purge  administered  by  Shake- 
speare to  Jonson  has  led  to  much  speculation  regard- 
ing Shakespeare's  part  in  this  professional  quarrel, 
and  "  Troilus  and  Cressida "  has  sometimes  been 
placed  among  the  plays  which  contributed  either 
light  or  heat  to  the  discussion  ;  many  of  Shake- 
speare's characters  have  been  identified  by  differ- 
ent critics  with  the  leading  combatants  and  with 
others  among  his  contemporaries ;  in  no  case,  how- 
ever, has  any  speculation  in  this  field  secured  a 
proper  basis  of  proof.  This  very  fact,  taken  in  con- 
nection with  Shakespeare's  long  and  cordial  rela- 
tions with  Jonson,  make  it  more  than  probable  that 
the  dramatist  stood  outside  the  arena,  maintaining 
a  friendly  attitude  toward  both  parties  to  the  strife. 

The  relations  between  Jonson  and  Shakespeare 
are  in  the  highest  degree  creditable  to  both ;  but  it 
is  probable  that  Shakespeare's  sweetness  of  nature 
was  the  chief  element  in  holding  them  on  so  high  a 
plane.  By  gifts,  temperament,  difference  of  early 
opportunity,  methods  of  work,  conceptions  of  art, 
the  two  were  for  many  years  rivals  for  supremacy 
in  the  playwright's  field.  The  contrast  between 


280  WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE 

them  could  hardly  have  been  more  marked.  Jonson 
was  nine  years  the  junior  of  Shakespeare,  having 
been  born  in  1573.  His  grandfather  had  been  a 
clergyman,  and  he  was  the  descendant  of  men  of 
gentle  blood.  He  was  city  born  and  bred  ;  at  West- 
minster he  came  under  the  teaching  of  a  man  of 
great  learning,  William  Camden,  who  made  him  a 
student  and  put  the  stamp  of  the  scholar  on  his 
mind.  He  became  a  devout  lover  of  the  classics 
and  a  patient  and  thorough  intellectual  worker. 
Poverty  forced  him  to  work  with  his  hands  for  a 
time,  and  when  the  War  of  the  Theatres  was  at  its 
height,  his  antagonists  did  not  hesitate  to  remind 
him  that  he  had  been  a  bricklayer  in  his  step- 
father's employ.  From  this  uncongenial  occupation 
he  found  escape  by  taking  service  in  the  Nether- 
lands, where  he  proved  his  courage  by  at  least  one 
notable  exploit.  He  returned  to  London,  and  mar- 
ried at  about  the  age  at  which  Shakespeare  took 
the  same  important  step.  He  was  a  loyal  and 
affectionate  father,  and  a  constant  if  not  an  ador- 
ing husband ;  he  described  his  wife  many  years 
after  his  marriage  as  "  a  shrew,  yet  honest." 

Like  Shakespeare,  he  turned  to  the  theatre  as  a 
means  of  support;  appeared  as  an  actor;  revised 
and,  in  part,  rewrote  older  plays ;  collaborated  with 
other  playwrights.  He  lacked  the  faculty  of  adap- 
tation, the  capacity  for  practical  affairs,  and  the  per- 
sonal charm  which  made  Shakespeare  successful  as 
a  man  of  business;  but,  through  persistent  and 


THE  APPROACH   OF  TRAGEDY  281 

intelligent  work,  he  placed  himself  at  the  head  of 
his  profession. 

He  was  of  massive  build ;  his  face  strong  rather 
than  sensitive  or  expressive ;  his  mind  vigorous, 
orderly,  and  logical,  rather  than  creative,  vital,  and 
spontaneous ;  he  was,  by  instinct,  habit,  and  con- 
viction, a  scholar ;  saturated  with  the  classical  spirit, 
absolutely  convinced  of  the  fixed  and  final  value  of 
the  classical  conceptions  and  methods  in  art ;  with 
a  touch  of  the  scholar's  contempt  for  inaccuracy, 
grace,  ease,  flexibility.  He  was  a  poet  by  intention, 
as  Shakespeare  was  a  poet  by  nature;  a  follower 
and  expounder  of  the  classic  tradition,  as  Shake- 
speare was  essentially  a  romanticist;  he  achieved 
with  labour  what  Shakespeare  seemed  to  accomplish 
by  magic ;  he  wrought  out  his  plots  with  the  most 
scrupulous  care  for  unity  and  consistency,  while 
Shakespeare  appeared  to  take  whatever  material 
came  to  hand  with  easy-going  indifference  to  the 
niceties  of  craftsmanship.  To  a  man  of  Jonson's 
rugged  and  somewhat  sombre  temper,  the  success 
and  love  which  Shakespeare  evoked  with  such  ease 
must  have  seemed  out  of  proportion  to  his  desert ; 
while  Shakespeare's  methods  of  work  must  have 
seemed  to  him  fundamentally  defective  and  super- 
ficial. It  was  a  case  of  great  dramatic  intelligence 
matched  against  great  dramatic  genius.  When  it 
is  remembered  that  the  two  men  were  working  in 
the  same  field  and  for  the  same  audience,  the  inten- 
sity of  their  rivalry,  and  the  provocations  to  jealousy 


282  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

and  ill  feeling  which  would  naturally  rise  out  of  it, 
become  very  clear. 

Shakespeare's  generous  nature,  reenforced  by  his 
breadth  of  vision,  apparently  kept  him  free  all  his 
life  from  any  touch  of  professional  jealousy  or  ani- 
mosity. Jonson  saw  his  rival  pass  him  in  the  race 
for  popular  favour,  and  could  hardly  have  been  blind 
to  the  fact  that  Shakespeare  distinctly  distanced 
him  in  artistic  achievement.  He  was  a  conscien- 
tious man,  standing  loyally  for  the  ideals  of  his  art ; 
he  was  a  scholar,  to  whom  accuracy  in  every  detail 
was  a  matter  of  artistic  morals ;  but  as  the  immense 
vitality  of  the  age  seemed  to  penetrate  to  the  very 
source  of  his  massive  intellect  and  lift  it  above  its 
laborious  methods  of  work  into  the  region  of  art, 
and  to  turn  its  painstaking  patience  into  lyrical 
ease  and  grace,  so  Jonson's  essential  integrity  of 
nature  and  largeness  of  mind  forced  upon  him  a 
recognition  of  his  rival's  greatness.  It  is  true  he 
sometimes  criticised  Shakespeare;  he  commented 
sharply  on  certain  passages  in  "Julius  Caesar," 
where  Shakespeare  was  on  his  own  ground ;  he 
declared  that  Shakespeare  had  "small  Latine  and 
less  Greek  " ;  that  he  "  wanted  art " ;  that  he  ought 
to  have  "  blotted  a  thousand  "  lines ;  that  he  "  had 
an  excellent  fancy;  brave  notions  and  gentle 
expressions ;  wherein  he  flowed  with  that  facility 
that  sometimes  it  was  necessary  he  should  be 
stopped ;  "  but  all  these  adverse  opinions,  for  which 
there  was,  from  Jonson's  point  of  view,  substantial 


THE   APPROACH    OF  TRAGEDY  283 

ground,  fall  into  true  perspective  and  are  evidences 
of  discriminating  judgment  rather  than  uncritical 
eulogy  when  the  passage  in  which  they  stand  is 
taken  in  its  entirety,  to  say  nothing  of  the  noble 
lines  which  appear  in  the  First  Folio.  "  I  loved 
the  man,"  wrote  Jonson,  "  and  do  honour  his  mem- 
ory, on  this  side  idolatry,  as  much  as  any.  He  was 
indeed  honest,  and  of  an  open  and  free  nature ;  had 
an  excellent  fancy ;  brave  notions  and  gentle  expres- 
sions. .  .  .  There  was  more  in  him  to  be  praised 
than  pardoned." 

That  there  were  occasional  outbursts  of  impa- 
tience with  Shakespeare's  ease,  spontaneity,  and 
indifference  to  the  taste  and  standards  of  men  who 
were  primarily  scholars  and  only  secondarily  poets, 
is  highly  probable ;  it  could  hardly  have  been  other- 
wise. To  men  of  plodding  temper,  of  methodical 
habits  of  work,  of  trained  faculties  rather  than  of 
force  and  freedom  of  imagination,  the  facility  of 
the  man  of  genius  often  seems  not  quite  normal 
and  sound;  it  is  incomprehensible  to  them,  and 
therefore  they  regard  it  with  a  certain  suspicion. 
It  is  greatly  to  Jonson's  credit,  when  his  temper 
and  circumstances  are  taken  into  account,  that  he 
judged  Shakespeare  so  fairly  and  recognized  his 
genius  so  frankly. 

There  is  good  reason  to  believe  that  Shakespeare 
kept  aloof  from  the  professional  quarrels  of  his  time 
among  his  fellow-craftsmen,  and  that  he  was  a  kind 
of  peacemaker  among  them ;  his  kindliness  went 


284  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

far  to  disarm  the  hostility  of  those  who  differed 
with  him  most  widely  on  fundamental  questions  of 
art.  It  is  an  open  question,  which  has  been  dis- 
cussed with  ability  on  both  sides,  whether  Jonson 
had  Shakespeare  in  mind  in  a  striking  passage  in 
"  The  Poetaster  " ;  it  is  quite  certain  that  he  could 
hardly  have  described  Shakespeare's  genius  more 
aptly : 

His  learning  labours  not  the  school-like  gloss 
That  most  consists  of  echoing  words  and  terms, 
And  soonest  wins  a  man  an  empty  name  ; 
Nor  any  long  or  far-fetch'd  circumstance 
Wrapp'd  in  the  curious  generalities  of  arts, 
By  a  direct  and  analytic  sum 
Of  all  the  worth  and  first  effects  of  art. 
And  for  his  poesy,  'tis  so  ramm'd  with  life, 
That  it  shall  gather  strength  of  life  with  being, 
And  live  hereafter  more  admired  than  now. 

Deeper  matters  than  occasional  references  to  his 
lack  of  scholarship,  and  sharp  antagonisms  among 
the  men  with  whom  he  worked  and  among  whom 
he  lived,  pressed  on  Shakespeare's  mind  and  heart 
in  the  opening  years  of  the  seventeenth  century. 
The  reign  of  Elizabeth  was  drawing  to  its  close, 
under  a  sky  full  of  ominous  signs.  The  splendour 
of  the  earlier  years,  which  has  given  the  reign  a 
place  among  the  most  magnificent  epochs  in  the 
annals  of  royalty,  had  suffered,  not  an  eclipse,  but 
a  slow  clouding  of  the  sky,  a  visible  fading  of  the 
day.  The  Queen  had  become  an  old  and  exacting 
woman,  craving  a  love  which  she  knew  was  not 


THE   APPROACH   OF   TRAGEDY 


given  her,  and  an  admiration  which  she  could  no 
longer  evoke.  She  still  held  her  place,  but  she 
understood  how  eagerly  many  who  surrounded  her 
with  service  and  protestations  of  devotion  were 
waiting  for  the 
end  and  the 
chances  of  pro- 
motion in  a 
new  court. 
While  they 
were  praising 
her  immortal 
youth,  they 
were  writing 
to  James  in 
Scotland  that 
she  was  aging 
rapidly  and 
that  the  end 
was  at  hand. 
There  were 
faces,  too,  that 
must  have 
been  missed  by  the  lonely  sovereign  as  she  looked 
about  her.  When  she  signed  the  death-warrant  of 
Essex,  she  ended  the  career  of  one  of  the  most 
brilliant  men  of  the  age,  and  one  of  her  most 
devoted  servants.  Southampton  was  sentenped  to 
death  at  the  same  time,  but  his  sentence  was  com- 
muted to  imprisonment  for  life.  The  people  firmly 


ROBERT    DEVEREUX,    EARL   OF    ESSEX. 

After  the  original  of  Walker  in  the  collection  of  the  Marquis  of 
Stafford. 


286  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

believed  in  Essex's  innocence  of  any  designs  upon 
the  Queen,  and  her  haughty  refusal  to  listen  to  the 
pleas  made  in  his  behalf  turned  their  hearts  against 
her.  The  Earl  of  Southampton  was  not  a  man  of 
sound  judgment  or  of  cool  temper;  but  there  were 
in  him  a  generosity  of  spirit,  a  loyalty  to  his  friends, 
and  a  charm  of  temper  and  manners  which  bound 
men  to  his  person  and  his  fortunes. 

Through  him  there  is  every  reason  to  believe 
that  Shakespeare  was  drawn  into  close  relations 
with  Essex,  who  was,  like  Southampton,  a  man 
who  lacked  the  qualities  of  character  necessary  for 
success  in  a  period  of  conflicting  movements  and 
sharp  antagonistic  influences,  but  who  had  a  win- 
ning personality.  In  the  prologue  to  the  fifth  act 
of  "  Henry  V."  Shakespeare  made  an  unmistakable 
allusion  to  Essex,  and  one  which  showed  how  near 
Southampton's  friend  was  to  his  heart : 

Were  now  the  general  of  our  gracious  empress, 
As  in  the  good  time  he  may,  from  Ireland  coming, 
Bringing  rebellion  broached  on  his  sword, 
How  many  would  the  peaceful  city  quit 
To  welcome  him  ! 

Later,  when  the  plot  against  the  ruling  party  at  the 
court  was  on  the  point  of  execution,  the  play  of 
"Richard  II."  was  put  on  the  stage  of  the  Globe 
Theatre  and  elsewhere  for  the  purpose  of  awaken- 
ing and  giving  direction  to  popular  indignation 
against  the  men  about  the  Queen.  It  is  probable 
that  the  play  produced  'under  these  circumstances, 


THE  APPROACH  OF  TRAGEDY        287 

and  at  the  instigation  of  the  organizers  of  the 
ill-fated  enterprise,  was  Shakespeare's  well-known 
drama.  This  play  never  had  the  approval  of  the 
Queen,  who  disliked  its  theme.  There  is  no  evi- 
dence beyond  this  fact  to  connect  Shakespeare  with 
the  plot  which  sent  Essex  to  the  block.  It  is  highly 
improbable  that  so  rash  an  enterprise  would  have 
secured  his  support.  It  was  not  necessary  that  he 
should  follow  Essex's  fortunes  in  order  to  love  him. 
Deficient  in  strength  and  ability  both  as  a  soldier 
and  a  politician,  Essex  knew  how  to  charm  not 
only  the  crowd  but  those  who  stood  near  him. 
His  face  has  that  touch  of  distinction  which  is  far 
more  captivating  than  many  more  solid  qualities. 
He  had  the  gracious  air  of  a  benefactor ;  there  was 
an  atmosphere  of  romance  and  adventure  about 
him ;  he  was  a  lover  of  the  arts  and  the  friend  and 
patron  of  writers,  who  recognized  and  rewarded  his 
generosity  in  a  flood  of  dedications  full  of  melodious 
praise.  The  temper  of  the  age  was  personified  in 
these  two  ardent,  passionate,  adventurous,  brilliant 
personalities  far  more  truly  than  in  many  men  of 
cooler  temper  and  more  calculating  spirit.  It  is 
significant  that  the  representative  men  of  the 
Elizabethan  period  rarely  husbanded  the  fruits  of 
their  genius  and  perils ;  they  lived  too  much  in  the 
imagination  to  secure  those  substantial  gains  which 
men  of  lesser  ability  but  greater  prudence  laid  up 
for  themselves.  Drake,  Raleigh,  Sidney,  Essex, 
Spenser,  were  splendid  spenders  of  energy,  time, 


288  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

genius,  and  opportunity,  rather  than  hoarders  of 
money,  influence,  and  power.  Shakespeare  gave 
full  value  to  sagacity,  prudence,  and  poise  of  char- 
acter, but  he  loved  the  adventurers  because  the 
light  of  the  imagination  was  on  their  careers  and 
the  touch  of  tragedy  on  their  fortunes. 

It  is  easy  to  understand,  therefore,  how  deeply 
the  fate  of  Essex  and  Southampton  weighed  upon 
his  heart.  In  their  downfall  the  iron  entered 
his  own  soul.  When  Elizabeth  died  in  1603,  ne 
remained  silent  while  the  chorus  of  poets  filled  the 
air  with  plaintive  eulogy.  Chettle  complained  that 
"  the  silver-tongued  Melicert,"  as  he  called  Shake- 
speare, did  not  "  drop  from  his  honied  muse  one 
sable  tear." 

The  temper  of  the  time  had  changed,  and  there 
were  unmistakable  signs  of  the  approaching  storm. 
The  deep  cleavage  which  was  to  divide  the  English 
people  for  many  decades  began  to  be  visible.  The 
Puritan  spirit  was  steadily  rising  under  the  pressure 
of  restriction  and  persecution ;  the  deep  springs  of 
gayety  in  the  English  nature,  which  ran  to  'the  sur- 
face in  all  manner  of  festivals  and  merry-making,  in 
a  passion  for  music  and  an  almost  universal  know- 
ledge of  the  art,  in  the  habit  of  improvising  songs 
and  a  general  appreciation  of  the  singing  quality 
which  gave  English  literature  almost  a  century  of 
spontaneous  and  captivating  song-writing,  were 
beginning  to  flow  less  freely  and  with  diminished 
volume 


THE   APPROACH   OF   TRAGEDY  289 

It  was  not,  therefore,  a  matter  of  accident,  or  as 
a  result  of  deliberate  artistic  prevision,  that,  about 
1 60 1,  Shakespeare  began  to  write  tragedies,  and 
continued  for  seven  or  eight  years  to  deal  with  the 
most  perplexing  and  sombre  problems  of  character 
and  of  life.  He  had  passed  through  an  emotional 
experience  which  had  evidently  stirred  his  spirit  to 
the  depths ;  the  atmosphere  in  which  he  lived  was 
disturbed  by  bitter  controversies ;  men  whom  he 
honoured  and  loved  had  become  the  victims  of  a 
tragic  fate ;  and  the  age  was  troubled  with  forebod- 
ings of  coming  strife.  The  poet  was  entering  into 
the  anguish  of  suffering  and  sharing  the  universal 
experience  of  loss,  surrender,  denial,  and  death. 
He  had  buried  his  only  son,  Hamnet,  in  the  sum- 
mer of  1596;  in  the  autumn  of  1601  his  father,  in 
whose  fortunes  he  had  manifested  a  deep  inter- 
est, died  at  Stratford,  and  was  buried  in  the  quiet 
churchyard  beside  the  Avon.  The  poet  had  learned 
much  of  life ;  he  was  now  to  learn  much  of  death 
also. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES 

THE  order  of  the  appearance  of  the  Tragedies 
has  not  been  definitely  settled;  they  were  written, 
however,  in  the  same  period,  and  that  period  began 
about  1601  and  ended  about  1609.  The  poet  was 
at  work  on  these  masterpieces  during  the  closing 
years  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  and  the  early  years 
of  the  reign  of  James  First.  While  he  was  medi- 
tating upon  or  writing  "  Julius  Caesar,"  Essex  and 
Southampton  had  embarked  upon  their  ill-planned 
conspiracy,  and  one  had  gone  to  the  block  and  the 
other  was  lying  in  the  Tower ;  soon  after  finishing 
"  Coriolanus,"  the  poet  left  London  and  returned  to 
Stratford.  The  first  decade  of  the  seventeenth 
century  was,  therefore,  his  "  storm  and  stress " 
period.  Its  chief  interest  lies  in  its  artistic  prod- 
uct, but  the  possible  and  probable  relations  of  his 
artistic  activity  to  his  personal  experience  have 
been  indicated.  Those  relations  must  not  be  in- 
sisted upon  too  strenuously ;  in  a  sense  they  are 
unimportant;  the  important  aspect  of  the  work  of 
this  decade  lies  in  the  continuity  of  mood  and 
of  themes  which  it  represents,  and  in  the  mastery 
of  the  dramatic  art  which  it  illustrates. 

290 


THE   EARLIER  TRAGEDIES 


291 


During  these  days  Shakespeare  dealt  continu- 
ously with  the  deepest  problems  of  character  with 
the  clearest  insight  and  the  most  complete  com- 


THE   AMERICAN    FOUNTAIN   AND    CLOCK -TOWER,    STRATFORD. 

mand  of  the  resources  of  the  dramatic  art.  It  is 
significant  of  the  marvellous  harmony  of  the  expert 
craftsman  with  the  poet  of  superb  imagination  that 
the  plays  of  this  period  have  been  at  the  same  time 
the  most  popular  of  all  the  Shakespearian  dramas 


292  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

with  theatre-goers  and  the  most  deeply  studied  by 
critical  lovers  of  the  poet  in  all  parts  of  the  world. 

Shakespeare  had  read  Holinshed  and  Hall  with 
an  insight  into  historic  incident  and  character  quite 
as  marvellous  in  its  power  of  laying  bare  the  sources 
of  action  and  of  vitalizing  half -forgot  ten  actors  in 
the  drama  of  life  as  the  play  of  the  faculty  of  in- 
vention, and  far  more  fruitful ;  he  now  opened  the 
pages  of  one  of  the  most  fascinating  and  stimulating 
biographers  in  the  whole  range  of  literature.  It 
is  doubtful  if  any  other  recorder  of  men's  lives 
has  touched  the  imagination  and  influenced  the 
character  of  so  many  readers  as  Plutarch,  to  whom 
the  modern  world  owes  much  of  its  intimate  and 
vital  knowledge  of  the  men  who  not  only  shaped 
the  destinies  of  Greece  and  Rome,  but  created  the 
traditions  of  culture  which  influenced  Shakespeare's 
age  and  contemporaries  so  deeply.  Part  of  Plu- 
tarch's extraordinary  influence  has  been  due  to  the 
inexhaustible  interest  of  his  material  and  part  to 
the  charm  of  his  personality.  He  was  and  will 
remain  one  of  the  great  interpreters  of  the  classical 
to  the  modern  world ;  a  biographer  who  breathed 
the  life  of  feeling  and  infused  the  insight  of  the 
imagination  into  his  compact  narratives.  It  has 
well  been  said  of  his  work  that  it  has  been  "  most 
sovereign  in  its  dominion  over  the  minds  of  great 
men  in  all  ages";  and  the  same  thought  has  been 
suggested  in  another  form  in  the  description  of 
that  work  as  "  the  pasturage  of  great  minds." 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES  293 

Sir  Thomas  North's  English  version  of  "  The 
Lives  of  the  Noble  Grecians,  compared  together  by 
that  grave  learned  philosopher  and  historiographer 
Plutarke,  of  Chaeronia,  translated  out  of  Greek 
into  French  by  James  Amyot,  Abbot  of  Belloxane, 
Bishop  of  Auxerre,  one  of  the  King's  Privy  Coun- 
cil, and  great  Amner  of  France,  and  now  out  of 
French  into  English  by  Thomas  North,"  was  pub- 
lished in  1579,  while  Shakespeare  was  coming  to 
the  end  of  his  school  days  in  the  Grammar  School 
at  Stratford ;  and  it  forms  one  of  that  group  of 
translations,  including  Chapman's  "  Homer,"  Florio's 
"  Montaigne,"  and  Fairfax's  "  Tasso,"  which,  in  their 
influence,  must  be  ranked  as  original  contributions 
to  Elizabethan  literature.  Plutarch  is  not  only  the 
foremost  biographer  in  the  history  of  Letters,  he 
had  the  further  good  fortune  to  attract  a  reader 
who,  more  than  any  other,  has  disclosed  the  faculty 
of  grasping  the  potential  content  of  a  narrative,  as 
well  as  mastering  its  record  of  fact.  It  is  one  of 
Plutarch's  greatest  honours  that  he  was  the  chief 
feeder  of  Shakespeare's  imagination  during  the 
period  when  his  genius  touched  his  highest  mark 
of  achievement;  for  it  was  in  Plutarch  that  the 
poet  found  the  material  for  three  of  the  greatest  of 
the  Tragedies,  "  Julius  Caesar,"  "  Antony  and  Cleo- 
patra," and  "  Coriolanus,"  and,  in  part,  for  "  Timon 
of  Athens."  Not  only  did  he  find  his  material  in 
Plutarch,  but  he  found  passages  so  nobly  phrased, 
whole  dialogues  sustained  at  such  a  height  of  dig- 


294 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


nity,  force,  or  eloquence,  that  he  incorporated  them 
into  his  work  with  essentially  minor  changes. 
Holinshed  furnished  only  the  bare  outlines  of 

movement  for 
"Richard  II." 
and  "Richard 
III.,"  but  Plu- 
tarch supplied 
traits,  hints,  sug- 
gestions, ph  rases, 
and  actions  so 
complete  in 
themselves  that 
the  poet  needed 
to  do  little  but 
turn  upon  the  bi- 
ographer's prose 
his  vitalizing  and 
organizing  imag- 
ination. The  dif- 
ference between 
the  prose  biog- 
rapher and  the 
dramatist  re- 
mains, however,  a  difference  of  quality  so  radical  as 
to  constitute  a  difference  of  kind.  The  nature  and 
extent  of  Shakespeare's  indebtedness  to  the  works 
upon  which  he  drew  for  material  may  be  most  clearly 
shown  by  placing  in  juxtaposition  Mark  Antony's 
famous  oration  over  Caesar's  body  as  Shakespeare 


MIDDLE   TEMPLE   LANE. 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES  295 

found  it  and  as  he  left  it :  "  When  Caesar's  body,'* 
writes  Plutarch,  "was  brought  into  the  market- 
place, Antonius  making  his  funeral-oration  in 
praise  of  the  dead,  according  to  the  ancient  custom 
of  Rome,  and  perceiving  that  his  words  moved  the 
common  people  to  compassion,  he  framed  his  elo- 
quence to  make  their  hearts  yearn  the  more,  and 
taking  Caesar's  gown  all  bloudy  in  his  hand,  he 
layed  it  open  to  the  sight  of  them  all,  shewing  what 
a  number  of  cuts  and  holes  it  had  in  it.  There- 
with all  the  people  fell  presently  into  such  a  rage 
and  mutinie  that  there  was  no  more  order  kept 
among  the  common  people." 

A  magical  change  has  been  wrought  in  this  nar- 
rative when  it  reappears  in  Shakespeare's  verse  in 
one  of  his  noblest  passages : 

You  all  do  know  this  mantle  :  I  remember 

The  first  time  ever  Caesar  put  it  on ; 

'Twas  on  a  summer's  evening,  in  his  tent, 

That  day  he  overcame  the  Nervii : 

Look,  in  this  place  ran  Cassius'  dagger  through ; 

See  what  a  rent  the  envious  Casca  made ; 

Through  this  the  well-beloved  Brutus  stabb'd ; 

And  as  he  pluck'd  his  cursed  steel  away, 

Mark  how  the  blood  of  Caesar  follow'd  it, 

As  rushing  out  of  doors,  to  be  resolved 

If  Brutus  so  unkindly  knock'd,  or  no; 

For  Brutus,  as  you  know,  was  Caesar's  angel : 

Judge,  O  you  gods,  how  dearly  Caesar  loved  him  ! 

This  was  the  most  unkindest  cut  of  all ; 

For  when  the  noble  Caesar  saw  him  stab, 

Ingratitude,  more  strong  than  traitor's  arms, 

Quite  vanquish' d  him  :  then  burst  his  mighty  heart : 


296  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

And,  in  his  mantle  muffling  up  his  face, 

Even  at  the  base  of  Pompey's  statua, 

Which  all  the  while  ran  blood,  great  Caesar  fell. 

"Julius  Caesar"  probably  appeared  in  1601. 
Many  facts  point  to  this  date,  among  them  the  oft- 
quoted  passage  from  Weever's  "  Mirror  of  Mar- 
tyrs," which  was  printed  in  that  year : 

The  many-headed  multitude  were  drawn 

By  Brutus'  speech,  that  Caesar  was  ambitious. 

When  eloquent  Mark  Antonie  had  shewn 

His  virtues,  who  but  Brutus  then  was  vicious? 

A  little  later,  in  a  still  greater  play,  Polonius,  recall- 
ing his  life  at  the  University,  said : 

I  did  enact  Julius  Caesar  :  I  was  killed  i'  the  Capitol : 
Brutus  killed  me. 

The  story,  like  many  others  with  which  Shake- 
speare dealt,  was  popular,  and  had  been  presented 
on  the  stage  at  an  earlier  date.  Shakespeare's 
rendering  was  so  obviously  superior  to  all  its  prede- 
cessors that  it  practically  put  an  end  to  further 
experiments  with  the  same  theme. 

In  the  English  historical  plays  the  dramatist 
never  entirely  broke  with  the  traditional  form  and 
spirit  of  the  Chronicle  play;  in  his  first  dealing 
with  a  Roman  subject  he  took  the  final  step  from 
the  earlier  drama  to  the  tragedy.  "Julius  Caesar" 
is  not,  it  is  true,  dominated  by  a  single  great  char- 
acter, as  are  the  later  Tragedies,  but  it  reveals  a 
rigorous  selection  of  incidents  with  reference  to 


THE   EARLIER  TRAGEDIES  297 

their  dramatic  value,  and  a  masterly  unfolding  of 
their  significance  in  the  story.  The  drama  was  not 
misnamed ;  although  Caesar  dies  at  the  beginning 
of  the  dramatic  movement,  his  spirit  dominates  it 
to  the  very  end.  At  every  turn  he  confronts  the 
conspirators  in  the  new  order  which  he  personified, 
and  of  which  he  was  the  organizing  genius.  Cas- 
sius  dies  with  this  recognition  on  his  lips : 

Caesar,  thou  art  revenged, 
Even  with  the  sword  that  kill'd  thee. 

And  when  Brutus  looks  on  the  face  of  the  dead 
Cassius  he,  too,  bears  testimony  to  a  spirit  which 
was  more  potent  than  the  arms  of  Octavius  and 

Antony : 

O  Julius  Caesar,  thou  art  mighty  yet ! 

Thy  spirit  walks  abroad,  and  turns  our  swords 

In  our  own  proper  entrails. 

This  new  order  in  the  Roman  world,  personified 
by  Caesar,  is  the  shaping  force  of  the  tragedy ; 
Octavius  represents  without  fully  understanding  it, 
and  Brutus  and  Cassius  array  themselves  against 
it  without  recognizing  that  they  are  contending 
with  the  inevitable  and  the  irresistible.  At  a  later 
day,  the  eloquent  and  captivating  Antony,  a  man 
of  genius,  enthusiasm,  and  personal  devotion,  but 
without  the  coordinating  power  of  character,  flings 
himself  against  this  new  order  in  the  same  blank 
inability  to  recognize  a  new  force  in  the  world,  and 
dies  as  much  a  victim  of  his  lack  of  vision  as 
Brutus  and  Cassius.  Nowhere  else  is  Shakespeare's 


298  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

sense  of  reality,  his  ability  to  give  facts  their  full 
weight,  more  clearly  revealed  than  in  "  Julius  Caesar." 
Brutus  is  one  of  the  noblest  and  most  consistent 
of  Shakespearian  creations;  a  man  far  above  all 
self-seeking  and  capable  of  the  loftiest  patriotism ; 
in  whose  whole  bearing,  as  in  his  deepest  nature, 
virtue  wears  her  noblest  aspect.  But  Brutus  is  an 
idealist,  with  a  touch  of  the  doctrinaire ;  his  pur- 
poses are  of  the  highest,  but  the  means  he  employs 
to  give  those  purposes  effect  are  utterly  inadequate ; 
in  a  lofty  spirit  he  embarks  on  an  enterprise  doomed 
to  failure  by  the  very  temper  and  pressure  of  the 
age.  "Julius  Caesar"  is  the  tragedy  of  the  conflict 
between  a  great  nature,  denied  the  sense  of  reality, 
and  the  world-spirit.  Brutus  is  not  only  crushed, 
but  recognizes  that  there  was  no  other  issue  of  his 
untimely  endeavour. 

The  affinity  between  Hamlet  and  Brutus  has 
often  been  pointed  out.  The  poet  was  brooding 
over  the  story  of  the  Danish  prince  probably  before 
he  became  interested  in  Roman  history ;  certainly 
before  he  wrote  the  Roman  plays.  The  chief  actors 
In  both  dramas  were  men  upon  whom  was  laid  the 


same  fatal  necessity ;  both  were  idealists  forced  to 


act  in  great  crises,  when  issues  of  appalling  magni- 


tude  hung  on  their  actions.     Their  circumstances 


were  wjd.ely  different,  but  a  common  doom  was  on 


both  :  they  weredriven  to  do  that  which  was  against 


their  natures. 


In  point  of  style  "  Julius  Caesar  "  marks  the  cul- 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES  299 

mination  of  Shakespeare's  art  as  a  dramatic  writer. 
The  ingenuity  of  the  earlier  plays  ripened  in  a  rich 
and  pellucid  flexibility ;  the  excess  of  imagery  gave 
place  to  a  noble  richness  of  speech ;  there  is  deep- 
going  coherence  of  structure  and  illustration ;  con- 
structive instinct  has  passed  on  into  the  ultimate 
skill  which  is  born  of  complete  identification  of 
thought  with  speech,  of  passion  with  utterance,  of 
action  with  character.  The  long  popularity  of  the 
play  was  predicted  by  Shakespeare  in  the  words  of 
Cassiu.s : 

How  many  ages  hence 

Shall  this,  our  lofty  scene,  be  acted  over 

In  States  unborn  and  accents  yet  unknown. 

The  great  impression  made  by  "Julius  Caesar" 
in  a  field  which  Jonson  regarded  as  his  own  prob- 
ably led  to  the  writing  of  "  Sejanus,"  which  ap- 
peared two  years  later,  and  of  "  Catiline,"  which 
was  produced  in  1611.  A  comparison  of  these 
plays  dealing  with  Roman  history  brings  into  clear 
relief  the  vitalizing  power  of  Shakespeare's  imagina- 
tion in  contrast  with  the  conscientious  and  scholarly 
craftsmanship  of  Jonson.  In  "  Sejanus  "  almost  every 
incident  and  speech,  as  Mr.  Knight  has  pointed 
out,  is  derived  from  ancient  authorities,  and  the 
dramatist's  own  edition  of  the  play  was  packed 
with  references  like  a  text-book.  The  characters 
speak  with  admirable  correctness  after  the  manner 
of  their  time ;  but  they  do  not  live.  Brutus,  Cas- 
sius,  Antony,  Portia,  on  the  other  hand,  talk  and  act 


300 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


r 


like  living  creatures,  and  the  play  is  saturated  with 

the  spirit  and  enveloped  in  the  atmosphere  of  Rome. 

The  story  of   Hamlet,  Prince  of  Denmark,  like 

that  of  Dr.  Faustus,  had  a  long  and  wide  popularity 

before  it  found 
place  among 
the  classics. 
There  was 
much  in  both 
tales  which  ap- 
pealed to  the 
popular  imagi- 
nation ;  there 
was  a  touch  of 
the  supernatu- 
ral in  both,  and 
the  Renais- 
sance mind 
still  loved  the 
supernatural ; 
there  was  in 
both  an  abun- 
dance of  hor- 
rors, and  the 
age  of  Shake- 
speare craved  strong  incitements  of  the  imagina- 
tion ;  and  in  both  there  was  a  combination  of  story 
and  psychologic  interest  which  appealed  from  the 
beginning  to  the  crowds  who  frequented  the  thea 
tres,  and,  later,  to  the  greatest  of  modern  poets.  In 


ELIZABETH. 
From  an  old  print 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES 


3OI 


this  fusion  of  immediate  human  interest  with  the 
very  highest  and  most  complex  problems  of  charac- 
ter and  destiny  these  two  stones  are  unique ;  and  it 
is  due  to  the  presence  of  these  qualities  that,  in 
their  final  versions,  these  stones  hold  the  first  place 
among  those  dramas  which  deal  with  the  ultimate 
questions  of  life. 

Saxo  Grammaticus,  who  lived  about  the  year  1 200, 
midway  between  the  earliest  crusades  and  the  dis- 
covery of  America,  was,  as  his  name  suggests,  a 
man  of  unusual  learning.  He  was  the  earliest 
Danish  writer  of  importance,  and  his  Latin  style 
evoked  the  admiration  of  so  competent  an  authority 
as  Erasmus,  who  expressed  his  surprise  that  a  Dane 
of  that  age  should  be  able  to  command  such  a  "  force 
of  eloquence."  The  great  work  of  this  brilliant 
Latinist  was  the  Historia  Danica,  or  "  History  of 
the  Danes  " ;  written,  there  is  reason  to  believe,  with 
Livy  as  a  model.  This  history,  like  all  other  histo- 
ries of  that  age,  was  largely  made  up  of  mythical 
and  legendary  tales  chiefly  illustrative  of  heroic 
persons  and  incidents.  One  of  the  most  striking 
of  these  hero  stories  is  that  which  relates  the  tragi- 
cal experiences  of  Hamlet;  in  his  origin  possibly 
one  of  those  mythical  figures  who  typified  the  forces 
of  nature  in  the  Norse  mythology.  The  roots  of 
great  works  of  art  are  sunk  deep  in  the  soil  of 
human  life ;  and  a  creation  of  the  magnitude  of  the 
Hamlet  of  Shakespeare  always  rests  on  a  broad, 
solid  foundation  of  prehistoric  myth,  or  legend,  or 


302  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

semi-historic  tradition.  Characters  of  such  world- 
wide significance  and  such  typical  experience  as 
Hamlet  and  Faust  are,  in  a  sense,  the  children  of 
the  race  and  are  born  in  those  fertile  ages  when  the 
imagination  plays  freely  and  creatively  upon  the  ex- 
ternal world  and  upon  the  facts  of  human  experi- 
ence. In  the  pages  of  Saxo  Grammaticus,  Hamlet 
is  a  veritable  man,  caught  in  a  network  of  tragical 
circumstances,  feigning  madness  to  protect  himself 
from  an  uncle  who  has  killed  his  father,  seized  the 
throne,  and  married  Hamlet's  mother,  and  who 
seeks  to  entrap  Hamlet  by  many  ingenious  devices. 
A  crafty  old  courtier  plays  the  eavesdropper;  a 
young  girl  is  put  forward  as  part  of  the  plot  against 
Hamlet ;  he  is  sent  to  England  and  secret  orders  to 
put  him  to  death  are  sent  with  him.  In  the  end 
Hamlet's  feigning  saves  him ;  he  kills  the  usurper, 
explains  his  deed  in  an  address  to  the  people,  and  is 
made  king. 

This  group  of  incidents  constitute  the  story  of 
Hamlet  in  its  earliest  recorded  form,  which  was  prob- 
ably the  survival  of  earlier  and  mythical  forms.  In 
the  fifteenth  century  the  story  was  widely  known 
throughout  Northern  Europe,  where  it  had  the 
currency  of  a  popular  folk-tale.  About  1570  it  was 
told  in  French  in  Belleforest's  Histoires  Tragiques. 
That  there  was  an  English  play  dealing  with  Ham- 
let as  early  as  1589  is  now  generally  believed.  In 
that  year  Greene  made  an  unmistakable  reference 
to  such  a  play ;  and  seven  years  later  Lodge  wrote 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES  303 

of  "  the  wisard  of  a  ghost,  which  cried  so  miserably 
at  the  theatre,  like  an  oyster-wife,  Hamlet  revenge" 
That  startling  cry  of  the  ghost  appears  to  have  made 
a  deep  impression  on  the  imagination  of  the  time, 
and  was  heard  on  the  stage  again  and  again  in  later 
plays. 

This  earlier  English  version  of  Hamlet  has  dis- 
appeared, but  the  probabilities  point  to  Thomas 
Kyd,  whose  "  Spanish  Tragedy "  was  one  of  the 
most  popular  plays  of  the  age,  as  its  author ;  there 
are  obvious  similarities  between  the  plays.  The 
introduction  of  the  ghost  was  in  keeping  with  the 
traditions  of  the  English  stage  and  the  temper  of 
the  time.  This  earlier  version  of  the  tragedy  was 
probably  a  very  rough  study,  so  far  as  action 
was  concerned,  of  Shakespeare's  work ;  some  frag- 
ments of  it  may  have  been  used  by  the  dramatist 
in  the  earlier  sketches  of  his  own  version ;  and 
some  remnants  of  it  are  to  be  found,  perhaps, 
in  a  German  version,  which  is  probably  a  copy  of 
a  translation  used  in  that  country  by  English  actors 
not  much  later  than  Shakespeare's  time.  It  is 
probable  that  both  the  author  of  the  lost  version 
and  Shakespeare  read  the  story  in  Belleforest's 
French  version. 

There  are  very  perplexing  questions  connected 
with  the  text  of  "  Hamlet "  as  it  is  found  in  differ- 
ent editions ;  the  probability  is  that  Shakespeare 
worked  his  material  over  more  than  once,  revising 
and,  in  part,  recasting  it.  There  is  reason  to 


304  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

believe  also  that  the  story  found  a  lodgement  in  his 
imagination  at  an  early  day,  and  that  it  slowly  took 
shape,  widening  in  its  significance  with  his  experi- 
ence, and  striking  deeper  root  in  the  psychology  of 
the  human  spirit  as  his  insight  into  life  deepened. 
This  was  the  history  of  the  growth  of  the  Faust 
idea  in  Goethe's  mind.  The  play  probably  ap- 
peared in  1602.  In  that  year  the  edition  known  as 
the  First  Quarto  was  published,  with  the  announce- 
ment on  the  title-page  that  the  piece  had  been 
"  acted  divers  times  in  the  city  of  London,  as  also 
in  the  two  Universities  of  Cambridge,  Oxford,  and 
elsewhere."  Although  the  longest  of  the  Shake- 
spearian plays,  and  farthest  removed  from  the 
ordinary  interests  of  theatre-goers,  "  Hamlet "  has 
not  only  been  critically  studied  and  widely  com- 
mented upon,  but  has  been  put  upon  the  stage  of 
every  civilized  country  and  has  awakened  an  unfail- 
ing popular  interest.  The  dramatic  movement  is 
much  slower  than  in  most  of  the  dramas ;  the  plot 
unfolds  very  gradually ;  there  are  a  number  of 
scenes  in  which  the  interest  is  almost  wholly  psy- 
chological ;  but  the  spell  of  the  play  has  been  felt  as 
keenly  by  the  unlearned  as  by  the  cultivated,  and 
the  story  has  appealed  as  directly  to  the  crowds 
before  the  footlights  as  to  students  and  critics. 
There  is  no  higher  evidence  of  Shakespeare's 
genius  than  this  presentation  of  a  great  spiritual 
problem  in  a  form  so  concrete  and  with  such  mar- 
vellous distinctness  of  characterization  that  "  Ham- 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES 


305 


let"  as  a  great  world-drama  and  "  Hamlet"  as  an 
engrossing  stage  play  may  be  seen  on  the  same 
stage  on  the  same  night. 

The  rough  sketch  upon 
which  Shakespeare  worked 
had  all  the  characteristics  of 
the  Elizabethan  play;  it  was 
sanguinary,  noisy,  full  of  move- 
ment, action,  crime  ;  it  was 
written  for  the  groundlings. 
Upon  this  elemental  basis, 
with  its  primary  and  immedi- 
ate elements  of  human  inter- 
est, Shakespeare  built  up  a 
drama  of  the  soul,  which  never 
for  a  moment  loses  touch  with 
reality,  and  never  for  a  mo- 
ment loses  its  universal  sig- 
nificance. In  the  pathetic 
figure  of  Hamlet,  with  his  gifts 
of  genius  and  personal  charm, 
every  generation  has  recog- 
nized the  protagonist  of  hu- 
manity^ The  concentration  of 
interest,  the  intensity  of  feel- 
ing, the  hushed  passion,  which 
characterize  the  play,  make  us 
feel  that  it  had 


tionally  close  relation   to  the 
poet's  experience,  and  that  in 


306  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

an  unusual  degree  his  personality  pervades  it.  There 
is  nothing  to  connect  it  with  the  happenings  of  his 
own  life  and  the  development  of  his  own  spirit  save 
the  fact  that  it  falls  within  the  tragic  period  and 
that  it  immediately  precedes  two  of  his  most  som- 
bre dramas.  The  authenticity  of  an  autograph  of 
Shakespeare  on  a  fly-leaf  of  a  copy  of  Florio's 
Montaigne  in  the  British  Museum  is  doubted,  but 
there  are  passages  in  "  Hamlet "  which  are  reminis- 
cent of  Montaigne's  speculations  and  reflections. 
It  was  in  his  own  nature,  however,  that  Shake- 
speare found  the  questionings,  the  perplexities, 
the  deep  and  almost  insoluble  contradictions,  which 
are  presented  with  such  subtle  suggestiveness  in 
"  Hamlet." 

No  play  has  called  forth  so  vast  a  literature  or 
has  been  the  subject  of  so  much  criticism  and  inter- 
pretation. The  problem  presented  by  Hamlet  is 
so  many-sided  that  it  will  evoke  the  thought  and 
ingenuity  of  every  successive  generation  of  students. 
Much  has  been  done,  however,  in  removing  obscuri- 
ties, and  discussion  has  cleared  the  air  of  some 
confusing  mists.  That  Hamlet  was  sane  is  the, 
conviction  of  the  great  majority  of  the  students  of 
the  play;  an  insane  Hamlet  would  rob  the  drama 
of  its  spiritual  significance  and  destroy  its  authority 
as  a  work  of  art.  That  in  his  long  feigning  Hamlet 
sometimes  lost  for  the  time  the  clear  perception  of 
the  difference  between  reality  and  his  own  fancies 
is  probable;  but  he  is  at  all  times  a  responsible 


THE   EARLIER  TRAGEDIES  307 

actor  in  the  drama  of  which  he  is  the  central  figure. 
Goethe's  exposition  of  his  nature  and  his  fate 
remains  one  of  the  classics  of  Shakespearian  criti- 
cism, so  clear  and  definite  is  its  insight  into  one 
aspect  of  Hamlet's  character. 

I"  The  time  is  out  of  Joint ;  O  cursed  spite.      I 
That  ever  I  was  born  to  set  it  right !  | 

"  In  these  words,  I  imagine,  is  the  key  to  Hamlet's 
whole  procedure,  and  to  me  it  is  clear  that  Shake- 
speare sought  to  depict  a  great  deed  laid  upon  a  soul 
unequal  to  the  performance  of  it.  In  this  view  I 
find  the  piece  composed  throughout.  Here  is  an 
oak  tree  planted  in  a  costly  vase,  which  should  have 
received  into  its  bosom  only  lovely  flowers ;  the 
roots  spread  out,  the  vase  is  shivered  to  pieces. 

"A  beautiful,  pure,  and  most  moral  nature,  with- 
out the  strength  of  nerve  which  makes  the  hero, 
sinks  beneath  a  burden  which  it  can  neither  bear 
nor  throw  off ;  every  duty  is  holy  to  him  —  this  too 
hard.  The  impossible  is  required  of  him  —  not  the 
impossible  in  itself,  but  the  impossible  to  him. 
How  he  winds,  turns,  agonizes,  advances,  and  re- 
coils, ever  reminded,  ever  reminding  himself,  and  at 
last  almost  loses  his  purpose  from  his  thoughts,  with- 
out ever  again  recovering  his  peace  of  mind.  .  .  . 

"  It  pleases,  it  flatters  us  greatly,  to  see  a  hero  who 
acts  of  himself,  who  loves  and  hates  us  as  his  heart 
prompts,  undertaking  and  executing,  thrusting  aside 
all  hinderances,  and  accomplishing  a  great  purpose. 
Historians  and  poets  would  fain  persuade  us  that  so 
proud  a  lot  may  fall  to  man.  In  "  Hamlet "  we  are 
taught  otherwise ;  the  hero  has  no  plan,  but  the 
piece  is  full  of  plan.  .  .  . 

"  Hamlet  is  endowed  more  properly  with  sentiment 
than  with  a  character ;  it  is  events  alone  that  push 


308  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

him  on ;  and  accordingly  the  piece  has  somewhat 
the  amplification  of  a  novel.  But  as  it  is  Fate  that 
draws  the  plan,  as  the  piece  proceeds  from  a  deed 
of  terror,  and  the  hero  is  steadily  driven  on  to  a 
deed  of  terror,  the  work  is  tragic  in  its  highest 
sense,  and  admits  of  no  other  than  a  tragic  end." 

This  interpretation  leaves  other  aspects  of  Ham- 
let unexplained.  This  subjective  condition  must  be 
supplemented  by  taking  into  account  the  objective 
world  in  which  Hamlet  found  himself.  Sensitive 
alike  in  intellect  and  in  his  moral  nature,  he  was 
placed  in  a  corrupt  society,  in  which  every  relation 
was  tainted.  The  thought  of  his  mother,  which 
ought  to  have  been  a  spring  of  sweetness  and 
strength,  was  unendurable.  He  was  surrounded 
by  false  friends  and  paid  spies.  Upon  him  was  laid 


the  appalling  task  of  reasserting  moral  order  in  a 


loathsome  household  and  a  demoralized  kingdom ; 


and  the  only  way  open  to  him  was  by  the  perpetra- 
tion of  a  deed  of  vengeance  from  which  his  whole 


nature  drew  back  in  revolt.     The  tragic  situation 


was  created  by  the  conflict  against  the  State  and 
the  family  to  which  he  was  committed  by  the  know- 
ledge of  his  father's  death,  his  uncle's  crime,  and  his 
mother's  lust,  and  the  conflict  within  himself  be- 
tween the  duty  of  revenge  and  the  horror  of  blood- 
shedding.  If  to  these  considerations  is  added  the 
fact  that  he  was  an  idealist,  with  a  deep  and  irre- 
sistible tendency  to  the  meditation  and  subtle  specu- 
lation which  feel  in  advance  all  the  possible  results 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES  309 

of  action  so  keenly  that  the  responsibility  for  acting 
becomes  almost  unbearable,  the  character  of  Ham- 
let becomes  intelligible,  if  not  entirely  explicable. 

The  weight  of  evidence  shows,  as  has  been  sug- 
gested, that  in  the  "  war  of  the  theatres "  which 
raged  at  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  and  the  begin- 
ning of  the  seventeenth  century  Shakespeare  took 
no  active  part ;  he  was  by  nature  free  from  the  nar- 
rowness of  partisanship,  and  there  are  indications 
that  he  was  on  friendly  terms  with  men  of  all 
shades  of  literary  opinion.  In  "  Hamlet,"  however 
he  distinctly  takes  sides  with  the  adult  actors 
against  the  growing  prominence  of  boys  on  the 
stage.  The  relation  of  boy  choirs,  and  especially 
that  of  the  Chapel  Royal,  to  the  theatre  in  Shake- 
speare's time  was  pointed  out  in  an  earlier  chapter. 
These  choirs  were,  in  an  informal  way,  training- 
schools  for  the  stage  at  a  time  when  all  women's 
parts  were  taken  by  boys,  and  there  was,  in  conse- 
quence, constant  need  of  their  services.  About  the 
time  of  the  appearance  of  "  Julius  Caesar  "  there  was 
a  sharp  rivalry  between  adult  and  boy  actors,  the 
public  espousing  warmly  the  performances  of  the 
boys.  The  development  of  this  rivalry  cannot  be 
traced,  but  in  1601  the  theatre-going  public  had 
become  partisans  of  the  boys  and  were  deserting 
the  theatres  in  which  adults  held  the  stage.  This 
preference  had  become  so  pronounced  that  Shake- 
speare's company  was  driven  into  the  provinces.  In 
their  travels  the  members  of  the  company  appeared 


310  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

at  Cambridge,  and  it  was  probably  on  this  visit 
that  the  new  play  of  "  Hamlet "  was  presented. 
The  popularity  of  the  boys  not  only  jeopardized 
the  fortunes  of  the  regular  companies,  but  seriously 
impaired  the  quality  of  the  performances.  When 
the  Children  of  the  Chapel  were  able  to  secure  for 
their  own  use  the  new  theatre  in  Blackfriars,  which 
Burbage  had  recently  built,  the  Globe  company 
began  to  feel  the  competition  very  keenly ;  and,  fot 
a  time,  so  marked  was  the  popularity  of  the  boys, 
their  prospects  and  those  of  the  art  of  acting  were 
dark  indeed. 

Shakespeare  was  at  work  on  "Hamlet"  in  this 
crisis  in  his  own  fortunes  and  those  of  the  theatre, 
and  stated  his  position  in  the  controversy  with 
entire  clearness.  In  answer  to  Hamlet's  question 
why  the  tragedians  travel  when  it  was  better  both 
for  reputation  and  profit  that  they  should  stay  in 
the  city,  Rosencrantz  replies  that  their  retirement 
into  the  provinces  has  been  caused  by  the  "  late 
innovation  " : 

"  Do  they  hold  the  same  estimation  they  did  when 
I  was  in  the  city  ?  Are  they  so  followed  ? 

"  No,  indeed,  are  they  not. 

"How  comes  it?  [continues  Hamlet];  do  they 
grow  rusty  ? 

"  Nay,  their  endeavour  keeps  in  the  wonted  pace  ; 
but  there  is,  sir,  an  aery  of  children,  little  eyases, 
that  cry  out  on  the  top  of  the  question,  and  are  most 
tyrannically  clapped  for't:  these  are  now  the  fash- 
ion, and  so  berattle  the  common  stages  —  so  they 


THE   EARLIER   TRAGEDIES  311 

call  them  —  that  many  wearing  rapiers  are  afraid  of 
goose-quills  and  dare  scarce  come  thither. 

"  What,  are  they  children  ?  who  maintains  'em  ? 
how  are  they  escoted  ?  Will  they  pursue  the 
quality  no  longer  than  they  can  sing  ?  will  they  not 
say  afterwards,  if  they  should  grow  themselves  to 
common  players  —  as  is  most  like,  if  their  means 
are  no  better  —  their  writers  do  them  wrong,  to 
make  them  exclaim  against  their  own  succession  ? 

"  'Faith,  there  has  been  much  to  do  on  both  sides  ; 
and  the  nation  holds  it  no  sin  to  tarre  them  to  con- 
troversy ;  there  was,  for  a  while,  no  money  bid  for 
argument,  unless  the  poet  and  the  player  went  to 
cuffs  in  the  question. 

"  Is't  possible  ? 

"  O,  there  has  been  much  throwing  about  of 
brains. 

"  Do  the  boys  carry  it  away  ? 

"  Ay,  that  they  do,  my  lord ;  Hercules  and  his 
]oad  too." 

This  conversation  between  Hamlet  and  Rosen- 
crantz  is  significant  of  the  close  touch  with  the 
realities  of  life  which  Shakespeare  never  lost  for  a 
moment,  even  when  dealing  with  the  greatest 
themes  or  creating  works  of  pure  imagination. 

To  this  period,  in  its  final  form,  at  least,  belongs 
the  play  of  "  All's  Well  that  Ends  Well,"  to 
which  Meres,  in  his  "  Palladis  Tamia,"  probably 
refers  when  he  includes  among  the  plays  ascribed 
to  Shakespeare  "  Love's  Labour's  Won."  It  was 
probably  sketched  and  perhaps  fully  written  at  a 
much  earlier  date  than  its  final  revision.  The  plot 
is  derived  from  a  group  of  stories  in  Boccaccio's 


312 


WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE 


"  Decameron,"  which  narrate  the  fortunes  of  lovers 
who  surmount  obstacles  and  gain  the  rewards  of 
love  only  after  great  or  persistent  effort;  a  phase 
of  experience  which  is  beyond  doubt  the  keynote  of 

the  play.  The 
story  was 
translated  by 
Paynter  and 
appeared  in 
English  in 
"  The  Palace 
of  Pleasure " 
in  1566  or 
1567.  Shake- 
speare depart- 
ed widely  from 
the  story  in  its 
earlier  form  by 
the  greater 
prominence 
given  to  the 
part  of  Hel- 
ena and  the  singular  sweetness  and  devotion  which 
irradiate  her  whole  course.  Coleridge  thought  her 
Shakespeare's  loveliest  creation.  The  portraiture  of 
her  character  is  touched  throughout  with  exquisite 
delicacy  and  skill.  Helena  suffers,  however,  from 
the  atmosphere  of  the  play,  which  is  distinctly 
repellent;  it  is  difficult  to  resist  the  feeling  that, 
conceding  all  that  the  play  demands  in  concentra- 


FRANCIS   BACON,    LORD    VERULAM. 
From  a  print  by  I.  Houbraken,  1738. 


THE  EARLIER   TRAGEDIES  313 

tion  of  interest  upon  the  single  end  to  be  achieved, 
Helena  cheapens  the  love  she  finally  wins  by  a 
sacrifice  greater  than  love  could  ask  or  could  afford 
to  receive.  And  when  the  sacrifice  is  made  and 
the  end  secured,  the  victory  of  love  is  purely  external ; 
there  is  no  inward  and  deathless  unity  of  passion 
between  the  lovers  like  that  which  united  Post- 
humus  and  Imogen  in  life  and  Romeo  and  Juliet  in 
death. 

The  play  must  be  interpreted  broadly  in  the 
light  of  Shakespeare's  entire  work ;  in  this  light  it 
finds  its  place  as  the  expression  of  a  passing  mood 
of  deep  and  almost  cynical  distrust;  it  is  full  of  that 
searching  irony  which  from  time  to  time  finds 
utterance  in  the  poet's  work  and  was  inevitable  in 
a  mind  of  such  range  of  vision.  It  is  well  to 
remember,  also,  that  in  this  play  the  poet,  for  the 
sake  of  throwing  a  single  quality  into  the  highest 
relief,  secured  entire  concentration  of  attention  by 
disregarding  or  ignoring  other  qualities  and  relations 
of  equal  importance  and  authority.  This  was  what 
Browning  did  in  his  much  misunderstood  poem 
"  The  Statue  and  the  Bust."  It  is  always  a  perilous 
experiment,  because  it  involves  so  much  intelligent 
cooperation  on  the  part  of  the  reader.  It  is  a 
triumph  of  Shakespeare's  art  that  Helena's  purity 
not  only  survives  the  dangers  to  which  she  exposes 
it,  but  takes  on  a  kind  of  saintly  whiteness  in  the 
corruption  in  which  she  plays  her  perilous  part. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES 

SHAKESPEARE  was  now  in  the  depths  of  the  deep 
stirring  of  his  spirit  which  has  left  its  record  in 
the  Tragedies.  The  darkest  mood  was  on  him, 
apparently,  when  "  Hamlet "  and  the  three  succeed- 
ing plays  were  written,  —  the  mood  in  which  the 
sense  of  evil  in  the  world  almost  overpowered  his 
belief  in  the  essential  soundness  of  life,  and  the 
mystery  of  evil  pressed  upon  the  imagination  with 
such  intensity  that  he  was  tempted  to  take  refuge 
in  fundamental  cynicism.  It  is  in  the  plays  of  this 
period  that  Shakespeare  gives  place  to  the  deep- 
going  irony  which  pervaded  the  Greek  drama,  and 
which  at  times  obscures  the  essential  freedom  and 
shaping  power  of  personality.  In  his  darkest  mood, 
however,  the  sanity  and  largeness  of  the  poet's 
mind  asserted  themselves  and  kept  the  balance 
against  the  temptation  to  narrow  the  vision  by 
tingeing  the  world  with  the  colour  of  a  mood,  or  by 
substituting  for  clear,  direct,  dispassionate  play  of 
the  mind  on  the  facts  of  life  the  easy  process  of 
reading  universal  history  in  the  light  of  personal 
experience. 

314 


THE   LATER  TRAGEDIES  315 

How  completely  Shakespeare  escaped  a  danger 
which  would  have  been  fatal  to  him  is  seen  in  the 
changes  he  wrought  in  the  story  which  forms  the 
basis  of  "  Measure  for  Measure."  This  play,  like 
"All's  Well  that  Ends  Well"  and  "  Troilus  and 
Cressida,"  is  painful  and  repellent;  it  is  tinged 
with  an  irony  which  has  a  corrosive  quality ;  it  is 
touched  with  a  bitterness  of  feeling  which  seems 
foreign  to  Shakespeare.  The  evil  of  life  was  evi- 
dently pressing  upon  his  imagination  so  heavily 
that  it  had  become  a  burden  on  his  heart.  In 
"  Hamlet "  he  had  portrayed  a  rotten  society ;  in 
"  Measure  for  Measure "  he  depicted  a  state  full 
of  iniquity  and  a  group  of  men  corrupted  by  the 
very  air  they  breathed ;  in  "  Troilus  and  Cressida  " 
the  same  vileness  was  personified  in  the  most  loath- 
some characters. 

In  the  great  Tragedies  we  breathe  an  air  which 
is  charged  with  fate,  and  feel  ourselves  involved 
in  vast  calamities  which  we  are  powerless  to  con- 
trol^ in  the  plays  which  have  been  named  we 
breathe  an  atmosphere  which  is  fetid  and  impure, 
and  human  nature  becomes  unspeakably  mean  and 
repulsive.  This  is,  perhaps,  the  effect  of  the  terrible 
strain  of  the  tragic  mood  on  Shakespeare's  spirit ; 
and  these  plays  are  to  be  accepted  as  expressions 
of  a  mood  of  depression  verging  upon  despair. 
They  are  often  classed  with  the  Comedies,  but 
they  belong  with  the  Tragedies,  not  only  in  temper, 
but  in  time. 


316  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

Even  in  this  blackness  of  thick  darkness  the 
poet's  sanity  is  never  lost.  In  a  dull  play  by 
George  Whetstone,  published  in  1587,  called  "  Pro- 
mos and  Cassandra  "  and  based  on  an  Italian  novel 
by  Cinthio,  who  also  worked  it  into  a  tragedy, 
Shakespeare  found  the  plot  of  "  Measure  for  Meas- 
ure " ;  the  story  was  told  in  prose  by  Whetstone 
four  years  later  in  a  collection  of  tales  which  he 
called  "  Heptameron  of  Civil  Discourses."  In  the 
title  of  the  play  the  earlier  dramatist  affirmed  that  it 
showed  in  the  first  part  "  the  unsufferable  abuse  of 
a  lewd  magistrate  ;  the  virtuous  behaviour  of  a  chaste 
lady ;  the  uncontrolled  lewdness  of  a  favoured  cour- 
tesan ;  and  the  undeserved  estimation  of  a  perni- 
cious parasite."  Shakespeare's  modifications  of  the 
plot  are  highly  significant:  in  the  older  versions 
Isabella  surrenders  her  virtue  as  the  price  of  her 
brother's  life ;  in  "  Measure  for  Measure  "  her  im- 
pregnable purity  gives  the  whole  play  a  saving 
sweetness.  To  Shakespeare's  imagination  is  due 
also  the  romantic  episode  of  the  moated  grange 
and  the  pathetic  figure  of  Mariana.  In  the  murky 
atmosphere  of  this  painful  drama  Isabella's  stain- 
less and  incorruptible  chastity  invests  purity  with 
a  kind  of  radiancy,  and  she  finds  her  place  in  the 
little  company  of  adorable  women  in  whom  Shake- 
speare's creative  imagination  realized  and  personi- 
fied the  eternal  feminine  qualities. 

"Measure  for  Measure"  was  probably  produced 
about  1 603,  and  "  Troilus  and  Cressida "  belongs, 


THE   LATER  TRAGEDIES  317 

in  its  final  form,  to  the  same  year.  The  problems 
presented  by  the  different  versions  are  not  more 
difficult  than  those  presented  by  the  play  itself, 
which  has  been  described  as  "  a  history  in  which 
historical  verisimilitude  is  openly  set  at  naught, 
a  comedy  without  genuine  laughter,  a  tragedy 
without  pathos."  The  editors  of  the  First  Folio 
were  so  uncertain  about  its  essential  character  that 
they  evaded  the  necessity  of  classifying  it  by  plac- 
ing it  between  the  Histories  and  the  Tragedies. 
In  temper,  spirit,  and  probably  in  time,  it  belongs 
with  the  Tragedies,  where  it  is  now  generally 
printed.  It  is  the  only  play  in  which  Shakespeare 
drew  upon  the  greatest  stream  of  ancient  story 
and  the  materials  for  which  he  found  in  many 
forms  in  the  literature  of  his  time.  Chief  among 
these  was  Chaucer's  noble  rendering  of  the  ancient 
romance,  to  which  may  be  added  Chapman's 
'  Homer,"  Lydgate's  "  Troy  Book,"  and  probably 
Robert  Greene's  version  of  the  story  which  ap- 
peared in  1587. 

In  this  play  Shakespeare  was  dealing  with  mate- 
rial which  had  generally  been  regarded  as  heroic 
and  which  was  rich  in  heroic  qualities ;  his  treat- 
ment is,  however,  essentially  satirical,  with  touches 
of  unmistakable  cynicism.  This  attitude  was  not, 
however,  entirely  new  to  Shakespeare's  auditors ; 
the  great  Homeric  story  had  already  been  handled 
with  a  freedom  which  bordered  on  levity.  Shake- 
speare shows  little  regard  for  the  proprieties  of 


318  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

classical  tradition;  this  satirical  attitude  did  not, 
however,  blur  his  insight  into  the  nature  of  the 
men  whom  he  portrayed. 

The  drama  brings  into  clear  light  the  irony  of 
human  fate ;  but  it  is  not  a  blind  fate  which  the 
dramatist  invokes  as  the  shaping  power  in  the 
drama;  it  is  a  fate  set  in  motion  by  the  funda- 
mental qualities  or  defects  of  the  chief  actors.  The 
special  aspect  of  irony  which  the  play  presents  is 
the  confusion  brought  into  private  and  public 
affairs  by  lawless  or  fatuous  love.  Thersites  goes 
to  the  heart  of  the  matter  when,  with  brutal  direct- 
ness, he  characterizes  the  struggle  as  a  "  war  for  a 
placket."  Helen, 

A  pearl, 
Whose  price  hath  launch'd  above  a  thousand  ships, 

involves  Greece  and  Troy  in  measureless  disaster, 
while  Cressida's  cheap  duplicity  makes  Troilus  the 
fool  of  fortune. 

This  play,  it  will  be  remembered,  has  been 
regarded  by  some  critics  as  a  contribution  to  the 
"war  of  the  theatres,"  and  as  containing  direct 
references,  not  only  to  the  matters  at  issue,  but 
•to  the  characteristics  and  works  of  the  chief  com- 
batants. Mr.  Fleay  has  made  a  thorough  study 
of  the  play  from  this  point  of  view,  and  has  pre- 
sented his  case  with  great  acumen  and  skilful 
arrangement  of  facts  and  inferences.  It  is  diffi- 
cult to  find  in  the  play,  in  its  present  form, 
adequate  basis  for  the  supposition  that  it  was 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  319 

written  as  an  attack  on  Jonson,  or  that  one  of 
Shakespeare's  contemporaries  is  portrayed  in  Ther- 
sites.  Shakespeare  may  have  touched  humorously 
on  some  of  the  extravagances  of  that  bloodless  but 
vociferous  combat ;  but  the  drama  must  have  had 
a  deeper  root.  Unsatisfactory  and  repellent  as  it 
is  in  some  aspects,  "  Troilus  and  Cressida "  has 
very  great  interest  as  a  document  in  Shakespeare's 
history  as  a  thinker  and  an  artist.  It  is  remark- 
able for  its  range  of  style,  reproducing  as  it  does 
his  earlier  manner  side  by  side  with  his  later 
manner.  It  is  notable  also  for  its  knowledge  of 
life,  expressed  in  a  great  number  of  sententious 
and  condensed  phrases ;  for  its  setting  aside  of 
the  dramatic  mask  and  direct  statement  of  the 
truth  which  the  dramatist  means  to  convey.  And 
it  is  supremely  interesting  because  in  the  person 
of  Ulysses,  the  real  hero  of  the  drama,  Shake- 
speare seems  to  present  his  own  view  of  life. 
The  ripest  wisdom  of  the  dramatist  speaks  through 
the  lips  of  this  typical  man  of  experience,  whose 
insight  has  been  corrected  by  the  widest  contact 
with  affairs,  whose  long  familiarity  with  the  world 
has  made  him  a  master  of  its  diseases,  and  whose 
speech  has  the  touch  of  universality  in  its  dis- 
passionateness, breadth,  and  clarity  of  vision.  This 
tragedy  of  disillusion  has  at  least  the  saving 
quality  of  a  rich  and  many-sided  knowledge  of 
life. 

Queen    Elizabeth   died   in    March,    1603,   while 


320  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Shakespeare  was  absorbed  in  the  problems  pre- 
sented in  the  Tragedies.  His  silence  when  the 
chorus  of  elegies  filled  the  air  has  already  been 
noted ;  his  friendship  for  Southampton  and  Essex 
had  probably  estranged  him  from  the  Queen. 
Shortly  after  his  accession  to  the  throne,  James  I. 
showed  his  favour  to  a  group  of  nine  actors, 


WILTON    HOUSE. 


among  whom  were  Shakespeare  and  Burbage,  by 
granting  them  a  special  license  of  a  very  liberal 
character,  and  giving  them  the  right  to  call  them- 
selves the  King's  Servants.  The  plays  of  Shake- 
speare were  repeatedly  presented  before  the  King 
at  various  places ;  among  them,  Wilton  House, 
the  residence  of  the  Earl  of  Pembroke,  which 
stands  in  a  charming  country  about  three  miles 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  32! 

from  Salisbury,  and  in  which  Sidney  wrote  the 
"Arcadia."  The  whole  region  is  touched  with 
literary  associations  of  the  most  diverse  kinds. 
The  course  of  travel  taken  by  Shakespeare's  com- 
pany makes  it  probable  that  he  saw  the  noble 
Cathedral  in  its  beautiful  close  as  Dickens  saw  it 
when  he  laid  the  scene  of  "  Martin  Chuzzlewit " 
in  that  neighbourhood,  and  that  he  passed  the 
little  church  where  holy  George  Herbert  lived 
five  years  of  his  beautiful  life  a  quarter  of  a  cen- 
tury later.  In  the  following  year,  wearing  the 
scarlet  robe  presented  for  the  occasion,  Shake- 
speare, in  company  with  other  actors,  walked  in 
the  procession  which  formally  welcomed  the  King 
to  London.  Mr.  Lee  agrees  with  Mr.  Halliwell- 
Phillipps  in  the  belief  that  Shakespeare  and  his 
fellow-actors  of  the  King's  Company  were  present 
at  Somerset  House  by  royal  order,  and  took  part 
in  the  magnificent  ceremonies  with  which  the 
Spanish  ambassador,  who  came  to  England  to 
ratify  the  treaty  of  peace  between  the  two  coun- 
tries, was  entertained  at  midsummer  in  the  same 
year.  And  during  the  succeeding  autumn  and 
winter  the  records  show  that  Shakespeare's  com- 
pany appeared  before  the  King  at  Whitehall  on 
at  least  eleven  occasions.  Much  as  the  King 
loved  the  society  of  prelates  and  the  amenities  of 
theological  discussion,  it  is  clear  that  he  was  not 
indifferent  to  the  charms  of  the  stage. 

One    of    the    plays   which    the    King   saw   was 


322  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

".Othello."  In  "Hamlet"  Shakespeare  spoke  for 
and  to  the  Germanic  consciousness ;  in  "  Romeo 
and  Juliet,"  and  still  more  directly  in  "  Othello," 
he  spoke  for  and  to  the  Latin  consciousness. 
"  Othello "  is  one  of  the  simplest,  most  direct, 
conventional,  and  objective  of  the  plays.  In  its 
main  lines  it  is  an  old-fashioned  drama  of  blood- 
shedding,  saved  by  the  penetrating  insight  with 
which  the  motives  of  the  chief  characters  are 
revealed,  and  by  the  vitalizing  skill  with  which 
the  situations  are  related  to  the  plot  and  the 
plot  rooted  in  the  moral  necessities  of  the  human 
nature  within  the  circle  of  movement.  The  thread 
of  the  story  was  clearly  traced  by  Cinthio  in  the 
series  of  novels  from  which  "  Measure  for  Meas- 
ure "  was  also  derived.  The  Italian  romancer 
furnished  nearly  all  the  incidents,  but  Shake- 
speare breathed  the  breath  of  dramatic  life  into 
them,  made  Othello  and  Desdemona  the  central 
figures,  and  developed  the  subtle  deviltry  of  lago. 
It  is  Othello's  open  and  generous  nature  which, 
like  the  idealism  of  Brutus,  makes  him  the  victim 
of  men  smaller  than  himself.  Desdemona  loves 
him  for  the  dangers  he  has  passed,  and,  like 
Helena,  surrenders  herself  without  question  or 
hesitation  to  her  passion.  The  audacity  of  her 
surrender  is  heightened  by  the  difference  of  race 
between  her  and  Othello  —  a  difference  so  wide 
and  deep  that  to  cross  it  almost  inevitably  created 
a  tragic  situation.  From  the  very  beginning  the 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  323 

play  is  touched  with  a  certain  violence  of  emotion 
and  action  which  bears  in  itself  the  elements  of 
disaster.  lago,  keeping  himself  in  the  background 
and  striking  blow  after  blow,  is  one  of  the  most 
significant  and  original  of  Shakespeare's  crea- 
tions—  a  malicious  servant  of  a  fate  compounded 
of  his  devilish  keenness  of  insight  into  the  weak- 
nesses of  noble  natures  and  of  their  unsuspi- 
cious trustfulness.  The  basis  of  tragedy  in  Othello 
was  his  ready  belief  in  lago  and  his  quickly 
awakened  distrust  of  Desdemona.  In  the  end, 
lago,  after  the  manner  of  those  who  invoke  the 
tragic  forces  for  their  own  evil  ends,  is  destroyed 
by  the  tempest  of  passion  he  has  let  loose  in  the 
world. 

By  reason  of  its  simplicity,  its  rapidity  of  move- 
ment, and  its  dramatic  interest,  "  Othello  "  has  long 
been  one  of  the  popular  Shakespearian  plays  on  the 
stage.  Its  chief  characteristic  is  perhaps  its  pathos ; 
the  deep  and  penetrating  appeal  which  the  spectacle 
of  the  defeat  of  two  noble  natures  by  pure  villany 
makes  to  the  imagination.  Wordsworth  declared 
that "  the  tragedy  of  Othello,  Plato's  records  of  the 
last  scenes  in  the  career  of  Socrates,  and  Izaak 
Walton's  *  Life  of  George  Herbert '  are  the  most 
pathetic  of  human  compositions." 

Shakespeare  was  now  swiftly  mounting  to  the 
sublimest  heights  of  dramatic  creation,  penetrating 
farther  and  farther  into  the  depths  of  the  human 
spirit,  and  steadily  bringing  the  tragic  movement 


324 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


home  to  the  soul  of  the  tragic  hero.  In  "  Romeo 
and  Juliet "  the  family  and  social  forces  are  more 
powerful  than  the  passion  and  devotion  of  the  ill- 
fated  lovers;  in  "Julius  Caesar"  the  interest  fast- 
ens upon  Brutus,  while  the  dead  Imperator  remains 
in  the  background  as  the  personification  of  a  new 


OLD   CLOPTON    BRIDGE. 


order  in  society  ;  in  "  Hamlet  "  the  time,  which  was 
out  of  joint,  must  be  taken  into  account  if  the  chief 
actor  is  to  be  made  comprehensible.  In  "  Othello  " 
the  essential  movement  is  wholly  within  the  circle 
of  the  character  of  the  protagonist  ;  the  tragic  action 
springs  out  of  Othello's  nature;  the  drama  issues 
out  of  the  heart  of  the  ^  hero  and  is  centred  in  him. 
This  marks  the  culmination  of  Shakespeare's  art 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  325 

as  a  dramatist ;  every  element  in  the  play  —  char- 
acter, action,  incident,  background  —  is  strictly  sub- 
ordinated to  the  unity  and  totality  of  the  movement, 
and  the  concentrated  energy  and  vitality  of  the 
dramatist's  genius  bear  the  drama  swiftly  forward  to 
the  dramatic  crisis. 

In  "  Macbeth,"  which  takes  rank  with  u  Hamlet," 
"  Lear,"  and  "  Othello  "  as  the  dramatic  masterpieces 
of  Shakespeare,  the  same  breadth  and  unity  of  in- 
terest are  notable.  It  is  one  of  the  shortest  of  the 
plays ;  there  is  almost  no  relief  from  humour  or  a 
subsidiary  plot;  the  style  is  broad  and  firm,  almost 
sketchy  in  the  largeness  of  outline  and  the  indiffer- 
ence to  detail.  The  brevity  and  condensation  of  the 
play  have  raised  the  question  whether  it  is  not  an 
abridgment.  There  is  no  question,  however,  regard- 
ing the  definiteness  and  completeness  of  impression 
which  it  conveys  —  an  impression  of  massive  and 
inevitable  tragedy.  The  sources  of  "  Macbeth  "  are 
to  be  found  in  Holinshed's  "  Chronicle  of  England 
and  Scotland " ;  suggestions  for  the  witch  scenes 
may  have  been  found  in  Scot's  "  Discoverie  of 
Witchcraft "  which  appeared  not  long  before  the 
poet  left  Stratford.  The  play  was  completed  about 
1606,  and  the  Scottish  background  suggests  that 
the  interest  of  the  King  in  the  scenic  and  historic 
associations  of  the  drama  may  have  directed  Shake- 
speare's attention  to  the  subject. 

"Macbeth  "  presented  the  poet  with  a  new  motive 
or  theme  of  dramatic  interest.  Up  to  this  point  the 


326  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

tragic  heroes  had  committed  deeds  of  violence,  but 
Lear  spoke  for  them  all  when  he  said : 

I  am  a  man  more  sinn'd  against  than  sinning. 

Macbeth  does  not  belong  in  this  company  of  the 
children  of  fate  ;  he  deliberately  sets  in  motion  the 
tragic  forces  which  sweep  the  stagej  he  becomes  a 
criminal  on  a  colossal  scale  ;  he  kills  his  king  under 
his  own  roof,  uses  murder  as  if  it  were  a  legitimate 
political  method,  and  converts  all  the  opportunities 
of  usurpation  into  a  consistent  practice  of  tyranny. 
He  fills  the  stage  ;  the  whole  drama  is  rooted  in  his 
nature;  and,  criminal  as  he  is,  he  commands  unwill- 
ing admiration  and  breathless  interest  by  the  mas- 
sive simplicity  of  his  character,  the  concentration  of 
his  purpose,  and  the  directness  of  his  action.  The 
play  moves  with  unusual  rapidity,  and  presents  no 
elements  which  withdraw  the  attention  for  a  mo- 
ment from  the  central  figures  or  the  swift  and  defi- 
nite movement. 

The  weird  sisters  on  the  blasted  heath  had  long 
been  part  of  the  Macbeth  legend.  In  Shakespeare's 
version  of  the  story  these  supernatural  beings  were 
neither  the  creations  of  Macbeth's  brain  nor  the 
masters  of  his  destiny;  they  had  objective  reality, 
but  they  were  not  the  ministers  of  fate.  Macbeth's 
fate  was  in  his  own  hands.  The  sisters  spoke  to 
Banquo  as  directly  as  to  Macbeth,  but  Banquo's 
clear  vision  and  deep  integrity  gave  their  word  no 
lodgement.  Whether  they  speak  truth  or  falsehood, 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  327 

they  leave  his  fate  untouched ;  in  Macbeth's  mind, 
on  the  other  hand,  they  find  a  quick  soil  for  evil 
suggestion. 

It  has  been  urged  by  several  critics  that  some 
parts  of  "  Macbeth  "  were  interpolated  at  a  later  day 
by  Thomas  Middleton,  chiefly  on  the  ground  that 
these  passages  are  un-Shakespearian  in  character, 
that  there  are  obvious  resemblances  between  the 
witch  scenes  in  the  play  and  Middleton's  play 
"  The  Witch,"  which  appeared  in  1610,  and  that  two 
songs  to  which  allusion  is  made  in  the  stage-direc- 
tions of  "  Macbeth  "  appear  in  "  The  Witch."  Charles 
Lamb  long  ago  pointed  out  the  marked  differences 
between  the  witches  of  Shakespeare  and  those  of 
Middleton  ;  the  resemblances  between  the  plays  are 
most  readily  explained  by  the  assumption  that 
Middleton  had  Shakespeare  too  much  in  his  mind. 
The  two  songs  beginning  "  Come  away,  come  away," 
and  "  Black  spirits  and  white,"  may  have  been 
written  by  Middleton  and  interpolated  in  the  acting 
version  of  "  Macbeth  "  at  a  later  date,  or  they  may 
have  been  written  by  Shakespeare  and  revised  or 
modified  by  Middleton.  The  scene  in  which  the 
porter  speaks  after  the  murder  was  long  regarded 
as  questionable.  Coleridge  found  the  introduction 
of  the  comic  element  too  abrupt,  and  failed  to  per- 
ceive the  deepening  of  the  tragic  impression  which 
the  scene  produces  by  its  startling  contrast  with  the 
awful  atmosphere  of  crime  which  pervades  the  castle. 
This  point  was  finally  settled  by  the  keen  instinct 


328  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

of  De  Quincey,  in  one  of  the  most  famous  passages 
in  Shakespearian  criticism : 

"  Another  world  has  stept  in ;  and  the  murderers 
are  taken  out  of  the  region  of  human  things,  human 
purposes,  human  desires.  They  are  transfigured  : 
Lady  Macbeth  is  '  unsexed ' ;  Macbeth  has  forgot 
that  he  was  born  of  a  woman ;  both  are  conformed 
to  the  image  of  devils ;  and  the  world  of  devils  is 
suddenly  revealed.  But  how  shall  this  be  conveyed 
and  made  palpable  ?  In  order  that  a  new  world 
may  step  in,  this  world  must  for  a  time  disappear. 
The  murderers  and  the  murder  must  be  insulated 
—  cut  off  by  an  immeasurable  gulf  from  the  ordi- 
nary tide  and  succession  of  human  affairs  —  locked 
up  and  sequestered  in  some  deep  recess;  we  must 
be  made  sensible  that  the  world  of  ordinary  life  is 
suddenly  arrested,  laid  asleep,  tranced,  racked  into 
a  dread  armistice ;  time  must  be  annihilated,  relation 
to  things  abolished  ;  and  all  must  pass  self-withdrawn 
into  a  deep  syncope  and  suspension  of  earthly  pas- 
sion. Hence  it  is  that,  when  the  deed  is  done, 
when  the  work  of  darkness  is  perfect,  then  the 
world  of  darkness  passes  away  like  a  pageantry  in 
the  clouds ;  the  knocking  at  the  gate  is  heard ;  and 
it  makes  known  audibly  that  the  reaction  has  com- 
menced ;  the  human  has  made  its  reflux  upon  the 
fiendish ;  the  pulses  of  life  are  beginning  to  beat 
again ;  and  the  reestablishment  of  the  goings-on 
of  the  world  in  which  we  live  first  makes  us  pro- 
foundly sensible  of  the  awful  parenthesis  that  had 
suspended  them." 

Dr.  Simon  Forman  has  left  an  account  of  a  per- 
formance of  "  Macbeth  "  which  he  saw  at  the  Globe 
Theatre  in  the  spring  of  1611.  The  play  finds  its 
place  in  the  front  rank  of  tragedies  ancient  or  mod- 


THE   LATER  TRAGEDIES  329 

ern ;  and  its  massive  structure,  its  boldness  of  con- 
ception, the  largeness  of  its  outlines,  have  inclined 
some  critics  to  give  it  the  first  place.  It  is  pervaded 
by  an  atmosphere  of  tragedy,  but  it  is  free  from  the 
irony  of  blind  fate.  Macbeth  is  not  the  victim  of 
a  fate  which  is  imposed  upon  him  from  without; 
he  invokes  the  fate  which  pursues  him,  and  "  life 
becomes  a  tale  told  by  an  idiot,  full  of  sound  and 
fury,  signifying  nothing,"  because  he  has  violated 
its  laws  and  wilfully  evoked  its  possibilities  of 
disaster. 

In  "  Macbeth "  the  epic  element  mingled  with 
the  dramatic ;  in  u  King  Lear  "  the  tragic  element 
is  supreme  and  unmixed,  and  the  tragic  art  of 
Shakespeare  touches  its  sublimest  height.  There 
is  no  more  tragic  figure  in  literature  than  that  of 
the  old  king,  accustomed  to  rule  and  flung  out  into 
the  night  by  the  children  among  whom  he  has 
divided  his  power;  intensely  affectionate  and  wil- 
fully irrational ;  with  all  the  majesty  of  a  king 
joined  to  the  passionateness  of  a  child ;  his  illu- 
sions destroyed,  his  reason  unseated ;  with  no 
companionship  save  that  of  the  fool,  wandering 
shelterless  in  the  storm,  symbolical  of  the  shatter- 
ing of  his  life  in  the  awful  tempest  of  passion.  .^^ 

This  Titanic  drama,  which  ranks  with  the  sub- 
limest work  of  ^schylus  and  Sophocles  and  stands 
alone  in  modern  literature,  was  performed  before 
the  King  at  Whitehall,  at  Christmas-tide,  1606. 
The  story,  in  a  condensed  form,  is  found  in  Geoffrey 


330 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


of  Monmouth's  "  Historia  Britohum,"  and  was  de- 
rived from  an  old  Welsh  chronicle ;  some  of  the 
motives  introduced  into  the  legend  appear  in  a 
wide  range  of  folk  tales.  Like  "  Hamlet,"  the 
formative  conception  in  "  King  Lear  "  has  its  foun- 


THE   HALL   AT   CLOPTON. 


dations  deep  in  the  vital  experience  of  the  race.  It 
is  Celtic  in  its  origin ;  but  it  found  its  setting  in 
literature  at  the  hands  of  the  old  English  chroniclers, 
Layamon,  Robert  of  Gloucester,  Robert  of  Brunne, 
and,  finally,  of  Holinshed,  in  whose  pages  Shake- 
speare read  it.  The  story  of  Cordelia  was  told  in  verse 
in  "  The  Mirrour  for  Magistrates  "  and  in  "  The  Faerie 
Queene,"  and  had  been  'dramatized  at  least  fifteen 


THE   LATER  TRAGEDIES  331 

years  before  Shakespeare  dealt  with  it.  The  poet's 
attention  may  have  been  definitely  drawn  to  the 
dramatic  possibilities  of  this  old  story  by  a  rude 
play  which  appeared  in  1605,  entitled  "The  True 
Chronicle  History  of  King  Leir  and  His  Three 
Daughters  —  Gondrill,  Ragan,  and  Cordelia";  a 
version  which,  in  the  opinion  of  Dr.  Ward,  seemed 
only  to  await  the  touch  of  such  a  hand  as  Shake- 
speare's to  become  "  a  tragedy  of  sublime  effective- 
ness." This  was  precisely  what  Shakespeare,  by 
omitting  irrelevant  parts,  by  a  free  use  of  all  the 
material,  and  by  entirely  reorganizing  it,  made  of 
the  old  folk  story. 

Appalling  as  is  the  presentation  of  the  play  of 
elemental  forces  and  passions  in  "  King  Lear,"  and 
completely  as  it  seems  to  break  away  from  all 
relation  to  a  spiritual  order,  and  to  exhibit  men  as 
the  sport  of  fate,  it  is,  nevertheless,  rooted  in  the 
character  of  the  men  and  women  who  are  tossed 
about  in  its  vast  movements  as  by  some  shoreless 
sea.  Gloucester,  the  putting  out  of  whose  eyes 
perhaps  surpasses  in  horror  any  other  incident  in 
the  plays,  is  not  so  blind  that  he  cannot  read  the 
story  of  his  own  calamities  in  the  sin  of  his  youth. 
We  are  reminded  of  this  relation  between  present 
misery  and  far-off  offences  when  Edgar  says : 

The  gods  are  just,  and  of  our  pleasant  vices 
Make  instruments  to  plague  us  ; 
The  dark  and  vicious  place  where  thee  he  got 
Cost  him  his  eyes. 


332  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

The  play  is  Titanic  not  only  in  force  and  gran- 
deur, but  in  the  elemental  character  of  the  passions 
and  ideas  which  contribute  to  the  catastrophe. 
Such  a  nature  as  Lear's  —  passionate,  wilful,  un- 
disciplined, dominated  by  a  colossal  egoism  —  could 
not  escape  a  conflict  of  appalling  dimensions.  When 
the  world  which  Lear  had  organized  about  him  by 
the  supremacy  of  his  own  will  was  shattered,  he 
could  neither  recognize  nor  accept  a  new  order,  but 
must  fling  himself  in  a  blind  passion  of  revolt  against 
the  new  conditions  which  he  had  unwittingly  brought 
into  being.  His  madness  grew  out  of  his  irrational 
attitude  towards  his  family. 

Lear's  sufferings  are  heightened  by  interweaving 
with  them  the  sufferings  of  Gloucester.  "  Were 
Lear  alone  to  suffer  from  his  daughters,"  wrote 
Schlegel,  "  the  impression  would  be  limited  to  the 
powerful  compassion  felt  by  us  for  his  private  mis- 
fortunes. But  two  such  unheard-of  examples  taking 
place  at  the  same  time  have  the  appearance  of  a 
great  commotion  in  the  moral  world  ;  the  picture 
becomes  gigantic,  and  fills  us  with  such  alarm  as 
we  should  entertain  at  the  idea  that  the  heavenly 
bodies  might  one  day  fall  from  their  appointed 
orbits."  To  still  further  deepen  this  impression, 
the  Fool,  the  very  soul  of  pathos  in  humorous  dis- 
guise, strikes  into  clear  light  not  only  the  King's 
misfortunes,  but  his  faults  as  well. 

In  "  King  Lear,"  as  clearly  as  in  the  other  trage- 
dies, men  reap  what  they  sow,  and  the  deed  returns 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  333 

to  the  doer  with  inexorable  retribution;  but  the  play 
is  not  to  be  explained  by  any  easy  and  obvious 
application  of  ethical  principles.  It  lifts  the  curtain 
upon  the  most  appalling  facts  of  life,  and  makes  no 
attempt  to  rationalize  them.  In  this  revelation  of 
the  ultimate  order  of  life,  which  is  inexplicable  by 
the  mind  in  its  present  stage  of  development,  the 
play  takes  its  place  with  the  Book  of  Job,  with  the 
great  trilogy  of  /Eschylus,  or  with,  the  sublime 
"  CEdipus  Tyrannus,"  of  which  Shelley  thought  it 
the  modern  equivalent.  Its  sublimity  lies  in  the 
vastness  of  its  presentation  of  the  great  theme  of 
human  suffering,  and  in  the  nobility  of  its  method. 
Such  a  theme  could  have  been  touched  only  by  a 
man  of  the  first  magnitude ;  and  such  a  man  could 
not  go  beyond  its  dramatic  presentation ;  to  have 
attempted  the  solution  would  have  cheapened  the 
work.  The  end  of  art  is  not  to  solve  the  problems 
of  existence,  but  to  deepen  and  freshen  the  sense  of 
life ;  when  this  sense  is  deep  and  fresh,  these  prob- 
lems are  so  dealt  with  that,  as  in  the  Book  of  Job, 
their  very  vastness  and  mystery  suggest  the  only 
adequate  and  satisfying  answer.  In  "  King  Lear,"  the 
greatest  dramatic  achievement  of  our  race,  the  poet 
so  enlarges  the  field  of  observation  and  dilates  the 
imagination  of  the  reader  that  the  postponement  of 
the  ultimate  solution  of  the  problem  of  the  tragedy 
is  not  only  inevitable,  but  is  the  only  outcome 
which  would  be  tolerated  by  the  reader. 

In  "  Timon  of  Athens,"  which  probably  followed 


334  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

close  upon  "  King  Lear  "  in  point  of  time,  the  poet 
turned  once  more  from  the  lofty  severity  of  tragedy, 
full  of  pity  and  of  terror,  to  the  easier,  narrower, 
and  less  noble  attitude  of  the  satirist,  in  whose  com- 
ment there  is  a  touch  of  corrosive  bitterness.  In 
style,  in  treatment,  and  in  attitude  this  play  is  so 
full  of  inconsistencies  and,  in  parts,  so  essentially 
un-Shakespearian,  that  it  is  now  generally  regarded 
as  a  sketch  made  by  the  poet,  but  elaborated  and 
put  into  its  present  form  by  other  and  later  hands. 
This  conclusion  seems  more  probable  than  the 
hypothesis  that  it  is  an  old  drama  worked  over  by 
Shakespeare,  or  that  it  was  the  product  of  collabo- 
ration with  another  playwright.  It  is  not  certain 
that  any  play  on  the  subject  was  known  to  Shake- 
speare, who  found  the  story  of  Timon  in  Plutarch's 
"  Life  of  Antonius,"  and  also  in  the  version  of  the 
story  in  that  repository  of  old  stories,  Paynter's 
"  Palace  of  Pleasure."  It  seems  probable  that  the 
author  of  the  play  was  familiar  with  Lucian's  dia- 
logue on  Timon. 

The  character  of  Timon  relates  itself  in  various 
ways  to  that  of  Lear.  Both  confided  blindly ;  both 
were  generous  without  measure  or  reason ;  there 
was  in  both  an  element  of  irrationality;  and  in 
both  the  reaction  was  excessive  and  akin  to  mad- 
ness. There  were  in  both  the  elements  of  simple 
and  kindly  goodness;  and  both  were  lacking  in 
perception  and  penetration.  In  both  the  seeds  of 
tragic  calamity  lay  very  near  the  surface.  The 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  335 

irony  of  Timon  lies  not  so  much  in  the  reaction  of 
his  irrational  prodigality  upon  his  fortunes  and 
character  as  in  the  fierce  light  thrown  upon  those 
who  had  benefited  by  his  lavish  mood.  Timon 
hates  mankind  upon  a  very  narrow  basis  of  per- 
sonal experience ;  Apemantus  hates  mankind  be- 
cause he  is  a  cynic  by  nature.  Timon  is  blind 
alike  to  the  good  and  the  evil  in  mankind;  he  fails 
to  recognize  the  loyal  devotion  of  his  steward  Fla- 
vius,  after  misfortunes  have  overtaken  him,  as  he 
failed  to  heed  his  warnings  in  the  days  of  prodigal- 
ity. In  this  blindness  his  calamities  are  rooted ;  it 
is  this  which  turns  all  the  sweetness  of  his  nature 
into  acid  when  the  world  forsakes  him  ;  and  it  is 
this  which  makes  his  judgment  of  that  world  value- 
less save  as  an  expression  of  his  own  mood.  "  Ti- 
mon" is  a  study  of  temperament,  not  a  judgment 
upon  life. 

There  could  hardly  have  been  a  greater  contrast 
of  subject  and  material  than  that  which  Shake- 
speare found  when  he  turned  from  "  King  Lear  "  or 
"  Timon  "  to  "  Antony  and  Cleopatrfl  " ;  a  tragedy 
almost  incredibly  rich  in  variety  and  range  of  char- 
acter and  in  splendour  of  setting.  He  had  recourse 
again  to  Plutarch's  "  Life  of  Antonius,"  fastening 
this  time  not  upon  an  episode,  but  upon  the  nature 
and  fate  of  one  of  the  most  fascinating  figures  on 
the  stage  of  the  antique  world.  That  world  he 
re-created  in  its  strength  and  weakness,  in  its  luxury 
and  magnificence,  in  a  drama  which  brought  before 


336  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

the  imagination  with  equal  firmness  of  touch  the 
power  of  Rome,  personified  in  the  disciplined  and 
far-seeing  Octavius,  the  voluptuous  temperament  of 
the  East  in  Cleopatra,  and  the  tragic  collision  of 
two  great  opposing  conceptions  of  life  in  Mark 
Antony  —  a  man  born  with  the  Roman  capacity  for 
action  and  the  Eastern  passion  for  pleasure.  In 
Caesar's  house  in  Rome,  in  newly  contracted  alli- 
ance with  Octavius,  Antony's  heart  is  in  Egypt: 

I'  the  East  my  pleasure  lies. 

The  style  marks  the  transition  to  the  poet's  latest 
manner ;  rhyme  almost  disappears,  and  "  weak  end- 
ings," or  the  use  of  weak  monosyllables  at  the  end 
of  the  lines,  become  very  numerous.  The  poet  had 
secured  such  conscious  mastery  of  his  art  that  he 
trusted  entirely  to  his  instinct  and  taste.  The 
story  in  Plutarch's  hands  has  a  noble  breadth  and 
beauty,  and  is  full  of  insight  into  the  ethical  rela- 
tions of  the  chief  actors  in  this  world-drama.  The 
full  splendour  of  Shakespeare's  genius  has  hardly 
done  more  than  bring  out  dramatically  the  signifi- 
cance of  these  great  words  of  the  Greek  biogra- 
pher: 

"Antonius  being  thus  inclined,  the  last  and  ex- 
tremest  mischief  of  all  other  (to  wit,  the  love  of 
Cleopatra)  lighted  on  him,  who  did  waken  and  stir 
up  many  vices  yet  hidden  in  him,  and  were  never 
seen  to  any ;  and  if  any  spark  of  goodness  or  hope 
of  rising  were  left  him,  Cleopatra  quenched  it  straight 
and  made  it  worse  than 'before." 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES 


337 


Again  and  again  Shakespeare  touched  upon  this 
great  theme  and  showed  how  tragic  disaster  issues 
out  of  unregulated  passion  and  infects  the  coolest 
nature  with  madness ;  but  nowhere  else  is  that 
tragedy  set  on  so  great  a  stage  and  so  magnificently 
enriched  with 
splendid  gifts 
of  nature, 
noble  posses- 
sions, and  al- 
most limitless 
opportunities 
of  achieve- 
ment. 

It  is  the 
drama  of  the 
East  and  West 
in  mortal  col- 
lision of  ideals 
and  motives, 
and  the  East 
succumbs  to 
the  superior  fibre  and  more  highly  organized  char- 
acter of  the  West.  Cleopatra  is  the  greatest  of  the 
enchantresses.  She  has  wit,  grace,  humour;  the 
intoxication  of  sex  breathes  from  her;  she  unites 
the  passion  of  a  great  temperament  with  the  fathom- 
less coquetry  of  a  courtesan  of  genius.  She  is  pas- 
sionately alive,  avid  of  sensation,  consumed  with 
love  of  pleasure,  imperious  in  her  demands  for  that 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

absolute  homage  which  slays  honour  and  saps  man- 
hood at  the  very  springs  of  its  power.  This  superb 
embodiment  of  femininity,  untouched  by  pity  and 
untroubled  by  conscience,  has  a  compelling  charm, 
born  in  the  mystery  of  passion  and  taking  on  the 
radiance  of  a  thousand  moods  which  melt  into  one 
another  in  endless  succession,  as  if  there  were  no 
limit  to  the  resources  of  her  temperament  and  the 
sorceries  of  her  beauty.  Of  her  alone  has  the 
greatest  of  poets  dared  to  declare  that  "age  can- 
not wither  her,  nor  custom  stale  her  infinite  variety." 
It  is  this  magnificence  which  invests  Cleopatra's 
criminality  with  a  kind  of  sublimity,  so  vast  is  the 
scale  of  her  being  and  so  tremendous  the  force  of 
her  passions. 

The  depth  of  Shakespeare's  poetic  art  and  the 
power  of  his  imagination  are  displayed  in  their  full 
compass  in  "  Antony  and  Cleopatra."  The  play  is 
vitalized  as  by  fire,  so  radiant  is  it  in  energy  and 
beauty  of  expression.  Not  only  are  the  chief 
figures  realized  with  historical  fidelity,  but  they 
breathe  the  very  atmosphere  of  the  East. 

In  "  Julius  Caesar"  there  is  Roman  massiveness 
of  construction  and  severity  of  outline ;  "  Antony 
and  Cleopatra  "  is  steeped  in  the  languor  and  lux- 
ury of  the  East  The  Roman  play  has  the  definite- 
ness  and  solidity  of  sculpture ;  the  Egyptian  play 
has  the  glow  and  radiancy  of  painting. 

The  study  of  classical  subjects  bore  final  fruit  at 
the  end  of  this  period  in  Shakespeare's  life  as  an 


THE   LATER   TRAGEDIES  339 

artist  in  "  Coriolanus,"  the  tragedy  of  a  great  na- 
ture wrecked  by  pride.  Written  about  1609,  and 
closely  related  to  the  magnificent  drama  of  the  East 
and  West,  the  poet  turned  for  the  last  time  to  the 
pages  of  Plutarch,  who  told  this  story,  as  he  told 
the  story  of  Antony,  with  a  noble  dignity  and  beauty 
which  were  not  lost  at  the  hands  of  the  English 
translator.  The  motive  of  the  play  is  so  admirably 
set  forth  in  a  few  phrases  in  the  "  Life  of  Corio- 
lanus "  that  it  is  impossible  to  avoid  quoting  them : 

"  He  was  a  man  too  full  of  passion  and  choler,  and 
too  much  given  over  to  self-will  and  opinion,  as  one 
of  a  high  mind  and  great  courage,  that  lacked  the 
gravity  and  affability  that  is  gotten  with  judgment 
of  learning  and  reason,  which  only  is  to  be  looked 
for  in  a  governor  of  State ;  and  that  remembered 
not  how  wilfulness  is  the  thing  of  the  world,  which 
a  governor  of  a  commonwealth,  for  pleasing,  should 
shun,  being  that  which  Plato  called  '  solitariness ' ; 
as,  in  the  end,  all  men  that  are  wilfully  given  to  a 
self  opinion  and  obstinate  mind,  and  who  will  never 
yield  to  other's  reason  but  to  their  own,  remain  with- 
out company  and  forsaken  of  all  men.  For  a  man 
that  will  live  in  the  world  must  needs  have  patience, 
which  lusty  bloods  make  but  a  mock  at.  So  Mar- 
cius,  being  a  stout  man  of  nature,  that  never  yielded 
in  any  respect,  as  one  thinking  that  to  overcome 
always  and  to  have  the  upper  hand  in  all  matters, 
was  a  token  of  magnanimity  and  of  no  base  and 
faint  courage,  which  spitteth  out  anger  from  the 
most  weak  and  passioned  part  of  the  beast,  much 
like  the  matter  of  an  impostume :  went  home  to  his 
house,  full  freighted  with  spite  and  malice  against 
the  people." 


340  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

The  humorous  scenes  which  give  the  play  vari- 
ety were  entirely  contributed  by  Shakespeare ;  and 
the  presentation  of  the  mob  is  highly  characteristic. 
The  poet  hated  the  irrationality  and  violence  of 
untrained  men.  Coriolanus  never  for  a  moment 
conceals  his  contempt  for  them : 

I  heard  him  swear, 

Were  he  to  stand  for  consul,  never  would  he 
Appear  i'  the  market-place,  nor  on  him  put 
The  napless  vesture  of  humility  ; 
Nor,  showing  (as  the  manner  is)  his  wounds 
To  the  people,  beg  their  stinking  breaths. 

This  is  quite  in  accord  with  Casca's  contempt  for 
the  "  rabblement  "  which  "  hooted,  and  clapped  their 
chapped  hands,  and  threw  up  their  sweaty  night- 
caps, and  uttered  such  a  deal  of  stinking  breath," 
because  Caesar  refused  the  crown.  This  contempt 
finds  its  most  satiric  expression  in  Jack  Cade's 
manifesto : 

"  Be  brave  then ;  for  your  captain  is  brave,  and 
vows  reformation.  There  shall  be,  in  England, 
seven  half-penny  loaves  sold  for  a  penny;  the  three- 
hooped  pot  shall  have  ten  hoops ;  and  I  will  make 
it  felony  to  drink  small  beer ;  all  the  realm  shall  be 
in  common,  and  in  Cheapside  shall  my  palfrey  go 
to  grass." 

In  complete  contrast  with  this  conception  of  the 
common  people  as  a  mere  rabble,  full  of  passion  and 
devoid  of  ideas,  stands  Coriolanus  —  a  typical  aris- 
tocrat, with  the  virtues  of  the  aristocrat :  courage, 
indifference  to  pain,  scorn  of  money,  independence 


THE   LATER  TRAGEDIES  34! 

of  thought,  command  of  eloquence,  and  natural  apti- 
tude for  leadership.  These  great  qualities  are  neu- 
tralized by  colossal  egotism,  manifesting  itself  in  a 
pride  so  irrational  and  insistent  that,  sooner  or  later, 
by  the  necessity  of  its  nature,  it  must  produce  the 
tragic  conflict.  Coriolanus,  in  spite  of  his  great 
faults,  has  heroic  proportions,  and  fills  the  play  with 
the  sense  of  his  superiority ;  he  lives  and  dies  like  a 
true  tragic  hero. 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE  ETHICAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  THE  TRAGEDIES 

MR.  DENTON  SNIDER,  who  has  interpreted  Shake- 
speare with  breadth  of  view  and  keenness  of  insight, 
and  has  brought  out  with  convincing  clearness  the 
poet's  conception  of  life  and  art  from  the  institu- 
tional point  of  view,  describes  the  Shakespearian 
drama  as  "the'grand  Mystery  Play  of  humanity." 
The  essence  of  the  mystery  play  was  the  disclosure 
of  a  divine  power  at  work  in  the  world  dealing 
directly  with  human  affairs;  the  interior  union  of 
the  seen  with  the  unseen,  of  the  temporal  with  the 
eternal,  of  the  human  with  the  divine,  was  set  out 
in  childlike  simplicity  in  these  dramas  of  mediaeval 
faith  and  genius.  In  Shakespeare  this  disclosure 
of  an  invisible  background  against  which  human  life 
is  set  and  from  the  order  of  which  it  cannot  escape 
without  setting  tragic  forces  in  motion,  took  on  a 
new  and  deeper  form  in  the  Tragedies  which  came 
from  his  hand  in  uninterrupted  succession  after 
1601.  In  these  dramas  all  the  elements  of  power 
and  art  which  were  present  in  germ  in  the  Mystery, 
the  Morality,  and  the  Interlude  were  unfolded  and 
harmonized  in  the  spirit  of  freedom  and  with  the 

342 


ETHICAL  SIGNIFICANCE   OF   THE  TRAGEDIES      343 

feeling  for  beauty  which  were  the  gifts  of  the 
Renaissance  to  the  greatest  of  its  children. 

Shakespeare  was  preeminently  a  poet,  and  it  is 
highly  improbable,  therefore,  that  he  thought  out 
in  advance  the  philosophical  bearings  of  his  art  and 
worked  out  for 
himself  a  sys- 
tematized con- 
ception of  life. 
Even  Goethe, 
whose  insight 
into  the  princi- 
ples of  art  pro- 
ductivity was  as 
clear  and  final 
as  his  creative 
genius  was  di- 
rect and  spon- 
taneous, was 
primarily  a  poet 
and  secondarily 

a   Critic   or  Dhi-         HENRY,  PRINCE  OF  WALES,  SON  OF  JAMES  i. 

losopher.  There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that 
Shakespeare's  view  of  life  came  to  him  through  the 
gradual  disclosure  of  an  experience  which  was 
rationalized  and  interpreted  by  habitual  meditation. 
A  nature  of  such  sensitiveness  and  receptivity  as 
his  would  feel  the  beauty  of  the  world  and  the 
variety,  the  interest,  and  the  humour  of  life  as  he 
felt  these  things  in  the  years  when  he  was  serving 


344  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

his  apprenticeship  and,  a  little  later,  writing  the 
Comedies.  Such  a  nature,  constantly  fed  by  that 
vital  sympathy  with  men  which  is  part  of  the  gift  of 
genius,  steadily  deepened  and  clarified  by  experience 
and  illumined  by  the  insight  of  genius,  would 
inevitably  pass  through  the  show  of  things  to  the 
moral  order  behind  them,  and  discern  more  and 
more  clearly  the  significance  of  character  in  the 
fortunes  and  fates  of  men,  as  Shakespeare  did  in  the 
period  of  the  historical  and  purely  poetic  dramas. 

If  at  this  stage  a  deep  and  searching  crisis  were  to 
occur  in  his  spiritual  life,  misfortune  overtake  the 
men  whom  he  loved  and  who  personified  for  him 
the  spirit  and  genius  of  his  time,  and  that  time,  so 
splendid  in  its  earlier  promise  and  performance,  be- 
come overclouded  like  a  day  fast  hastening  to  night, 
his  vision  would  insensibly  widen  and  deepen,  as 
did  Shakespeare's  when  he  entered  upon  the  period 
of  the  Tragedies.  Through  all  the  earlier  years  in 
London  he  was  steadily  approaching  the  mystery 
of  life;  in  the  years  of  the  Tragedies  he  entered 
into  that  mystery  and  was  enfolded  by  it.  He 
wrote  the  Tragedies  as  he  had  written  the  Come- 
dies, because  the  creative  impulse  was  on  him  and 
play-writing  was  his  vocation ;  but  the  order  of  the 
world  which  comes  to  light  in  them,  giving  sig- 
nificance to  human  striving  and  suffering,  was  not 
less  clearly  seen  nor  less  authoritatively  revealed 
because  Shakespeare  did  not  definitely  set  it  before 
him  as  the  object  of  his  artistic  endeavour.  The 


ETHICAL  SIGNIFICANCE   OF   THE  TRAGEDIES      345 

poet  is  a  more  impressive  witness  to  the  ethical 
order  of  life  than  the  moralist,  because  his  discovery 
of  that  order  is,  in  a  sense,  incidental  and  uninten- 
tional ;  he  sees  it,  not  because  he  set  out  to  discover 
it,  but  because  it  is  there  and  he  cannot  avoid 
seeing  it. 

That  Shakespeare  deliberately,  and  in  a  spirit  of 
philosophic  detachment  from  life,  studied,  after  the 
manner  of  a  psychologist,  the  phenomena  of  expe- 
rience, and  formulated  a  system  of  interpreting 
those  phenomena,  is  incredible  in  the  exact  degree 
in  which  one  comprehends  his  nature ;  that  he  was 
blind  to  this  great  order,  that  he  did  not  discern 
what  he  saw  nor  understand  what  he  said,  that  his 
mind  was  simply  a  mirror  in  which  was  caught  up 
the  reflection  of  a  world  which  he  never  realized  in 
consciousness,  is  still  more  incredible.  When  he 
laid  aside  the  dramatic  mask,  as  he  did  at  times  in 
the  Sonnets  and  more  than  once  in  the  plays,  and 
notably  in  "  Troilus  and  Cressida,"  he  made  it  plain 
that  he  understood  the  significance  of  his  own 
thought,  and  that  his  attitude  toward  the  great 
matters  with  which  he  deals  was  intelligent  and 
deliberate,  if  not  at  all  moments  self-conscious. 

It  was  his  rare  good  fortune  as  an  artist  to  pluck 
the  fruits  of  the  most  searching  scrutiny  of  the 
facts  of  life  without  losing  that  free  and  captivating 
spontaneity  which  is  the  joy  of  art;  to  command 
the  knowledge  of  the  psychologist  without  losing 
the  magic  of  the  poet ;  to  be  at  the  same  time  one 


346  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

of  the  most  penetrating  of  thinkers  and  the  most 
beguiling  of  poets,  with  a  clear  vision  of  the  deepest 
realities  of  existence  and  a  voice  full  of  the  careless, 
rapturous  melody  of  birds  under  the  free  sky. 

In  the  period  of  the  Tragedies  Shakespeare  set 
forth  with  perfect  clearness  his  view  of  man's  place 
and  meaning  in  the  world.  His  whole  conception 
of  the  authority  and  significance  of  human  nature 
rests  on  personality  —  the  master  word  of  the 
thought  of  the  Western  world  and  the  source  of  its 
formative  ideas  of  freedom,  responsibility,  beauty, 
democracy,  the  reality  of  experience,  the  dignity  of 
individual  effort,  and  personal  immortality.  In  the 
Tragedies  Shakespeare  worked  out  in  dramatic 
form  this  central  conception  about  which  Western 
thought,  since  Plato,  has  organized  itself.  He 
exhibits  the  individual  man  as  shaping  his  destiny 
largely  by  his  own  will ;  as  fashioning  himself 
chiefly  through  action,  by  means  of  which  ideas 
and  emotions  are  transmuted  into  character  and 
re-form  the  man.  The  problem  of  life,  as  it  is  pre- 
sented in  the  Shakespearian  dramas,  is  to  bring  the 
individual  will  into  harmony  with  the  institutional 
life  of  society,  organized  in  the  family,  the  Church, 
and  the  State ;  and  to  bring  these  institutions  into 
harmony  with  the  immutable  principles  of  righteous- 
ness. This  result  is  brought  about  in  the  Trage- 
dies by  the  collision  of  the  individual  with  the 
established  order,  either  to  his  own  hurt  or  to  the 
betterment  of  the  order  itself ;  and  the  moment  of 


ETHICAL   SIGNIFICANCE   OF   THE  TRAGEDIES      347 

collision  is  the  moment  of  tragedy.  It  is  at  this 
moment,  when  the  inner  subjective  force  of  the 
man  sweeps  into  light  through  action,  becomes 
objective  and  begins  to  affect  others,  to  set  in 
motion  reactions  upon  himself  and  to  change  the 
order  of  things  about  him,  that  Shakespeare  fastens 
attention  upon  the  tragic  character;  and,  through 
the  collision  between  his  will  and  the  order  of 
society  or  of  life,  reveals  as  by  a  lightning  flash 
the  soul  of  the  man  and  the  visible  or  invisible 
order  in  which  his  life  is  set. 

As  clearly  as  does  Dante,  though  in  a  very  dif- 
ferent fashion,  he  shows  the  inevitable  reaction  of 
the  deed  upon  the  doer,  and  so  strikes  into  sudden 
light  the  massive  and  all-embracing  moral  order  of 
life.  He  swept  away  the  last  lingering  shadows 
of  the  pagan  conception  of  fate  by  showing  that 
character  is  destiny,  and  that  "  character  is  the  only 
definition  we  have  of  freedom  and  power." 

In  the  word  character  —  the  organization  of 
impulse,  emotion,  will,  and  deed  into  a  permanent, 
self-conscious  personality,  which  becomes  a  shaping 
force  in  the  world  —  is  to  be  found  the  key  to 
Shakespeare's  conception  of  life  and  of  the  function 
of  dramatic  art.  If  he  made  plays  which  were  suited 
to  the  taste  of  his  age  and  were  skilfully  adapted  to 
the  limitations  and  possibilities  of  the  stage  in  his 
day,  he  also  made  dramas  which  disclosed  the  most 
searching  study  of  human  experience,  and  the  most 
adequate  and  ultimate  interpretation  and  represen- 


348  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

tation  of  that  experience  in  the  forms  of  art.  He 
was  at  once  a  trained  and  practical  playwright,  with 
a  first-hand  knowledge  of  his  business  and  of  his 
constituency;  and  he  was  also  a  thinker  and  an 
artist  of  the  first  order ;  and  there  was  no  contra- 
diction between  the  man  of  skill  and  the  man  of 
genius  in  the  same  personality.  The  difficulty  in 
understanding  and  accepting  the  many-sidedness  of 
Shakespeare  and  the  happy  balance  of  spontaneity 
and  reflection  in  him  has  its  roots,  not  in  the 
limited  potentialities  of  the  human  spirit,  but  in 
the  lack  of  imagination  on  the  part  of  his  readers. 
The  miracle  of  genius  —  that  magical  insight  which 
is  apparently  independent  of  character  in  its  origin, 
but  largely  dependent  on  character  for  harmonious 
and  adequate  expression  ;  which  never  originates 
in  any  kind  of  education,  but  is  largely  conditioned 
upon  education  for  its  free  and  full  development  — 
is  incredible  to  those  who  strive  to  reduce  life  and 
its  arts  to  a  set  of  formulae,  and  to  divide  men 
arbitrarily  into  types  which  are  consistent  through- 
out. Shakespeare  is  not  to  be  explained  by  a 
formula  nor  to  be  studied  as  a  type  of  mind  formed 
by  a  rigid  method ;  he  was  neither  an  irresponsible 
genius,  to  whom  great  thoughts,  unerring  insights, 
and  moments  of  inspired  speech  came  without 
sequence  or  relation  to  his  inner  life,  nor  was  he 
a  systematically  trained,  intensely  self-conscious 
workman,  whose  happiest  strokes  were  planned 
with  the  nicest  sense  of  craftsmanship,  and  whose 


ETHICAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  THE  TRAGEDIES      349 

consistent  and  coherent  view  of  life  was  thoroughly 
thought  out  before  the  first  studies  were  put  on 
paper. 

He  was  primarily  and  always  a  poet ;  it  was  as  a 
poet  that  he  first  won  recognition,  and  it  was  in 
the  poetic  temper  and  view  of  things  that  he  found 
refuge  and  peace  after  the  period  of  the  Tragedies 
was  passed ;  and  during  the  years  when  the  dra- 
matic instinct  and  impulse  dominated  him  and 
shaped  his  work,  his  methods,  his  spirit,  and  his 
relations  to  his  vocation  were  those  of  a  poet.  As  a 
poet  he  saw  with  the  clearness  of  direct  vision  and  felt 
with  the  freshness  and  power  of  spontaneous  emo- 
tion, arid  he  instinctively  passed  behind  the  fact  to 
the  truth  which  it  suggested  or  illustrated ;  but  this 
spontaneous  action  of  his  nature  was  broadened, 
deepened,  and  brightened  by  quick  and  sensitive 
perception  of  the  value  and  uses  of  methods,  tools, 
and  instruments  of  every  kind,  and  by  habitual 
meditation  on  the  spectacle  of  life  as  it  lay  in  his 
imagination.  It  is  impossible  to  separate  the  poetic 
and  the  philosophic  in  his  nature,  to  mark  the 
points  at  which  the  process  of  observation  ends 
and  the  free  play  of  the  imagination  begins ;  to 
sever  that  which  was  acquired  from  that  which  was 
creative  in  him  ;  to  divide  the  conscious  from  the 
unconscious  elements  in  his  power  and  his  life ; 
to  distinguish  between  the  thinker  and  the  poet  in 
his  work.  His  work  reveals  with  the  utmost  clear- 
ness a  coherent  and  profound  view  of  life,  consist- 


350  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

ently  set  forth  in  a  long  series  of  dramas;  every 
page  bears  the  unmistakable  stamp  of  the  thinker ; 
but  the  mind  behind  this  varied  and  splendid  work 
is  the  mind  of  a  poet,  and  the  personality  which 
shapes  all  this  material  into  forms  of  beauty  is  that 
of  the  artist.  When  this  point  of  view  is  taken, 
Shakespeare's  genius  does  not  cease  to  be  marvel- 
lous, but  it  does  cease  to  be  incredible. 

The  fate  of  the  critic  who  attempts  to  slip  the 
net  of  logical  definition  over  this  elusive  spirit  was 
charmingly  portrayed  by  Heine  in  a  passage  which 
students  of  the  dramatist  will  do  well  to  keep  in 
mind: 

"I  fell  asleep  and  dreamed,"  writes  Heine  — 
"  dreamed  that  it  was  a  starry  night,  and  I  swam 
in  a  small  boat  in  a  wide,  wide  sea,  where  all  kinds 
of  barks  filled  with  masks,  musicians,  and  torches 
gleaming,  music  sounding,  many  near  or  afar,  rowed 
on.  There  were  costumes  of  all  countries  and 
ages,  old  Greek  tunics,  mediaeval  knightly  coats, 
Oriental  turbans,  shepherds'  hats  with  fluttering 
ribbons,  masks  of  beasts  wild  or  tame  —  now  and 
then  I  thought  I  saw  a  well-known  face,  sometimes 
I  heard  familiar  greetings  —  but  all  passed  quickly 
by  and  far  away,  and  the  merry  music  grew  softer 
and  fainter,  when,  instead  of  the  gay  fiddling,  I 
heard  near  me  the  mysterious,  melancholy  tones 
of  hunters'  horns  from  another  part.  Sometimes 
the  night  wind  bore  the  strains  of  both  to  my  ear, 
and  then  the  mingled  melody  made  a  happy  har- 


ETHICAL   SIGNIFICANCE   OF   THE  TRAGEDIES      351 

mony.  The  water  echoed  ineffably  sweet  sounds 
and  burned  as  with  a  magical  reflection  of  the 
torches,  and  the  gayly-pennoned  pleasure  boats  with 
their  wondrous  masquerades  swam  in  light  and 
music.  A  lovely  woman,  who  stood  by  the  rudder 
of  one  of  the  barks,  cried  to  me  in  passing,  *  Is  it 
not  true,  friend,  thou  wouldst  have  a  definition  of 
the  Shakespearian  comedy  ? '  I  know  not  whether 
I  answered  '  Yes,'  but  in  that  instant  the  beautiful 
woman  dipped  her  hand  in  the  water  and  sprinkled 
the  ringing  sparks  in  my  face,  so  that  there  was  a 
general  laughter,  and  I  awoke." 

Many  students  and  critics  who  have  forgotten 
that  Shakespeare  is  first  and  always  a  poet,  and 
have  approached  him  as  if  he  were  primarily  a 
philosopher,  have  shared  Heine's  disaster  without 
the  consolation  of  Heine's  vision. 

In  the  Tragedies  Shakespeare  touched  the 
highest  point  of  his  power  and  his  art ;  more 
adequately  than  the  Histories,  Comedies,  or 
Romances  they  give  that  impression  of  final  author- 
ity which  issues  only  from  the  greatest  work  of  the 
greatest  minds,  and  which  has  its  roots  in  the  per- 
ception that  in  these  masterpieces  the  study  of 
character  is  most  searching  and  its  portraiture  most 
convincing.  If  the  view  of  life  and  art  which  lies 
at  the  heart  of  the  thought  and  action  of  the 
Western  races  is  sound,  Shakespeare  becomes,  in 
these  great  plays,  their  foremost  interpreter,  It  is 
in  these  dramas  that  the  function  of  action  is 


352  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

revealed  in  a  full,  clear,  adequate  way  almost  for  the 
first  time  in  literature,  and  the  process  of  historic 
development  is  set  forth  not  as  an  intellectual  but 
as  a  vital  evolution.  The  problem  of  existence  is 
not  to  be  solved  by  the  action  of  the  mind  alone ; 
men  deal  with  life  primarily  not  as  thinkers  but  as 
men,  with  all  the  resources  of  a  complex  nature  ; 
with  instincts,  appetites,  passions ;  with  emotion, 
thought,  and  will.  By  means  of  action,  impulse 
and  thought  pass  out  of  the  region  of  pure  subjec- 
tivity into  the  world  of  actuality  and  become 
definite,  concrete,  potential ;  through  action,  they 
react  on  the  actor  and  reform  or  transform  existing 
conditions  and  institutions.  They  create  a  human 
world  against  the  background  of  the  natural  world ; 
they  exhibit  the  human  spirit  in  this  world  by  giv- 
ing external  form  to  its  inward  and  hidden  nature ; 
men  cease  to  be  mere  observers  and  reflectors ; 
they  become  creative,  and  through  action  they  enter 
into  history  and  shape  its  movement.  This  action 
may  not  always  justify  itself  in  its  positive  results, 
but  it  always  reveals  man  to  himself  and  to  his 
fellows ;  it  evokes  his  power,  liberates  him  from  the 
limitations  of  his  own  experience  by  setting  him  in 
a  universal  order ;  develops  his  personality  ;  gives, 
in  a  word,  free  play  to  the  human  spirit,  makes  it 
conscious  of  its  place  in  the  order  of  life,  and  pro- 
vides an  educational  process  which  makes  life 
intelligible,  gives  it  moral  significance,  dramatic 
interest,  and  invests  it 'with  immortal  hopes.  In 


ETHICAL   SIGNIFICANCE   OF   THE   TRAGEDIES      353 


I 


these  dramas  the  ultimate  truths  of  life  and  the 
deepest  secrets  of  experience  are  organized  into 
forms  of  the  highest  beauty,  and  a  great  light 
suddenly  shines  in  the  heart 
of  man;  for  all  true  art  is  the 
illumination  of  experience. 

The  vital  quality  of  Shake- 
speare's work,  its  living  force, 
its  convincing  reality,  are 
rooted  in  the  closeness  of  its 
relation  to  experience,  in  the 
directness  with  which  life  fed 
the  springs  of  his  nature  and 
the  sources  of  his  art.  The 
conception  of  life,  as  revealed 
in  the  vast  range  of  human 
action  reacting  on  character, 
not  only  gives  the  ethical  sig- 
nificance of  his  work  convinc- 
ing authority,  but  stretches  and 
expands  indefinitely  the  nor- 
mal and  wholesome  range  of 
human  interest  beyond  the  ar- 
bitrary and  shifting  limits  set 
by  different  schools  and  suc- 
cessive generations  of  moral- 
ists. Shakespeare's  ethical 
view  of  life  was  rooted  in  real- 
ities and  had  the  large,  vigor- 
ous vitality  of  an  elemental 


2.* 


354  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

order,  spacious  enough  to  admit  of  the  full,  free, 
and  normal  development  of  the  human  spirit  on  all 
sides.  To  a  mind  of  such  breadth  of  view  and 
deep  vitality  as  his  any  kind  of  asceticism  was  not 
only  a  violation  of  instinct  but  of  the  nature  of 
man  ;  any  kind  of  denial  of  the  dignity  of  the  body 
was  as  truly  atheistic  as  any  kind  of  denial  of  the 
reality  of  the  experiences  of  the  spirit.  Into  the 
region  of  pure  spiritual  impulse  and  ultimate 
spiritual  relationship  Shakespeare  did  not  pene- 
trate ;  in  that  fact  lies  his  limitation.  If  to  his  other 
gifts  had  been  added  the  spiritual  insight  of  Dante, 
he  would  have  been  not  only  the  foremost  but  the 
ultimate  interpreter  of  the  life  of  the  race.  In  the 
region  of  action,  however,  where  spiritual  impulses 
and  convictions  are  worked  into  character,  Shake- 
speare is  a  master  of  observation  and  of  interpreta- 
tion. He  sees  the  facts,  and  he  sets  them  in  their 
ethical  order.  In  this  field,  therefore,  his  freedom, 
his  range,  and  the  vast  variety  of  his  interests  are 
significant  of  the  breadth  and  compass  of  normal 
human  living. 

It  is  needless  to  prove  that  he  was  not  a  Puritan, 
to  quote  "  I  had  as  lief  be  a  Brownist  as  a  politi- 
cian," or  "  Though  honesty  be  no  Puritan,  yet  it 
will  be  no  hurt ;  it  will  wear  the  surplice  of  humility 
over  the  black  gown  of  a  big  heart ;  "  by  the  very 
constitution  of  his  mind  Shakespeare  was  set  apart 
for  another  service  to  his  kind,  and  committed  to  a 
different  view  of  life.  'The  Puritan,  with  all  his 


ETHICAL   SIGNIFICANCE   OF  THE   TRAGEDIES      355 

devotion  and  greatness  of  soul,  was  the  master  of  a 
crisis,  the  man  of  a  period,  the  representative  of  a 
phase  of  human  development ;  Shakespeare  was  the 
master  of  the  universal  movement  of  life,  the  man 
of  all  time,  the  exponent  of  the  full  and  free  play  of 
all  the  forces  of  personality.  He  stands,  therefore, 
not  for  the  occasional  altitudes  of  human  experi- 
ence, but  its  broad,  general,  productive  movement ; 
for  large,  varied,  many-sided,  fertile  life,  with  full 
play  of  instinct,  passion,  emotion,  thought,  and  will; 
for  freedom  in  an  ordered  world,  in  which  all  normal 
human  faculties  and  desires  are  to  find  normal  ex- 
pression and  use ;  in  which,  however,  law  and 
proportion  and  harmony  between  different  parts  of 
the  nature  are  to  be  preserved,  the  lower  is  to  be 
subordinated  to  the  higher,  the  individual  kept  in 
his  place  in  the  social  order,  and  the  institutional 
life  of  society  sustained  at  any  private  cost. 

In  such  a  world  what  was  universal  and  endur- 
ing in  the  Puritan  view  was  kept ;  what  was  pro- 
visional and  divisive  rejected.  It  was  a  world  in 
which  the  Greek  and  the  man  of  the  Renaissance 
temper  could  live  as  freely  as  the  man  of  the 
Hebrew  spirit.  It  follows,  therefore,  that  the  ethi- 
cal order  of  Shakespeare's  world  must  be  found 
in  the  structure  of  that  world,  not  in  conventional 
or  sectarian  interpretations  or  expositions  of  its 
order.  Shakespeare's  morality  is  the  morality  of 
fundamental  law,  not  of  provisional  rules ;  his 
righteousness  is  the  righteousness  of  sane,  whole- 


356  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

some,    ordered    living,    not    of    conventional    good 
behaviour. 

To  a  mind  of  Shakespeare's  breadth  of  view  no 
conception  of  the  ethical  constitution  of  things  less 
fundamental  was  possible ;  he  saw  too  far  to  accept 
any  local  standards  of  right  action  or  any  provi- 
sional views  of  human  duties.  In  the  wide  range 
of  his  vision  of  the  fortunes  of  men  the  rigid  and 
fixed  bounds  set  to  moral  responsibility  by  sectarian 
moralists  of  every  school  lost  their  authority ;  the 
vast  complexity  of  experience,  the  immense  range 
of  conditions,  the  influence  of  institutions  on  char- 
acter, the  pathetic  and  often  tragic  enfolding  of  a 
soul  by  circumstances  which  leave  their  stain  and 
stamp  upon  it,  the  antagonistic  elements  which  are 
at  war  in  the  noblest  character  —  all  these  things 
touched  Shakespeare's  judgments  with  a  great  com- 
passion, and,  while  unflinching  in  his  disclosure  of 
the  penalty  which  lies  in  the  heart  of  the  evil  deed, 
made  him  slow  to  measure  out  moral  condemnation 
to  the  evil-doer.  He  could  not  fail  to  be  aware, 
with  all  men  of  imagination  and  insight,  of  the 
vaster  movement  which  enfolds  the  obvious  ethical 
order  of  life.  Like  Goethe  in  "  Faust,"  and  Haw- 
thorne in  "The  Marble  Faun,"  he  had  glimpses  of 
"  a  soul  of  goodness  in  things  evil,"  divinations  of  a 
diviner  reconciliation  between  conflicting  elements 
than  is  accomplished  on  the  narrow  stage  of  the 
world.  This  deep  mystery  he  could  not  probe ;  no 
man  has  sounded  it;  it  enfolds  us  like  an  element 


ETHICAL   SIGNIFICANCE    OF    THE   TRAGEDIES      357 


of  which  we  suspect  the  existence,  but  which  our 
instruments  of  observation  are  not  sensitive  enough 
to  discover.  Its  presence  does  not  diminish  the 
authority  of  the  ethical  order 
under  which  we  live  and  from 
which  no  man  escapes,  but  it 
ought  to  make  us  more  tolerant, 
compassionate,  and  patient  in 
judgment  and  in  punishment. 

"  The  web  of  our  life  is  of  a 
mingled  yarn,  good  and  ill  to- 
gether," says  the  dramatist  in 
one  of  the  group  of  plays  which 


are  most  perplexing  to  the  mor- 
alist who  lacks  this  vision  of  a 
larger  order ;  "  our  virtues  would 
be  proud  if  our  faults  whipped 
them  not ;  and  our  crimes  would 
despair  if  they  were  not  cher- 
ished by  our  virtues." 

This  largeness  of  view  gave 
Shakespeare  the  highest  insight 
of  the  great  tragic  writer:  the 
clear  perception  of  the  presence 
of  a  mediating  element  in  life. 
Without  this  perception  the 
highest  form  of  tragedy  is  im- 
possible of  realization  ;  for  trag- 
edy is  not  only  an  exhibition  of 
tragic  events,  but  an  interpre- 


n 


fl| 


358  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

tation  of  their  significance.  Without  this  inter- 
pretation these  events  are  blind  happenings,  —  mere 
brutalities  of  fate,  without  order,  meaning,  or  im- 
pressiveness.  If  Shakespeare's  view  of  life  was  too 
broad  to  permit  of  a  judgment  of  men  from  the 
standpoint  of  conventional  morality,  his  insight  was 
too  deep  and  searching  to  rest  in  the  violent  colli- 
sions of  contending  principles,  forces,  and  persons. 
He  could  not  stop  short  of  some  kind  of  harmony ; 
violence  in  its  destructive  aspect  had  only  a  minor 
interest  for  him ;  he  cared  for  the  storm  because  it 
cleared  the  air  and  prepared  the  way  for  a  new  and 
higher  order  of  things.  The  deed  reacts  on  the 
doer  and  brings  doom  with  it,  but  the  penalty  is 
not  inflicted  as  a  matter  of  vengeance ;  it  opens  the 
door  to  a  reorganization  of  character.  For  the  evil- 
doer, the  violator  of  the  order  of  society,  the  real 
tragedy  is  to  be  found  in  the  offence,  not  in  the 
penalty ;  and  the  greatest  disaster  comes  not  when 
the  punishment  is  borne,  but  when  it  is  evaded.  In 
this  consistent  representation  of  the  inevitableness 
and  necessity  of  the  tragic  disaster  Shakespeare  is 
in  harmony  with  the  soundest  religious  view  of  life 
and  with  the  most  intelligent  psychology.  As  soon 
as  personality  is  set  free  in  society,  directed  by 
inward  intelligence,  will,  or  impulse,  put  under  the 
necessity  of  subordinating  impulse  to  intelligence, 
appetite  to  law,  individual  desire  to  the  good  of 
society,  a  series  of  tragic  collisions  is  set  in  motion 
and  a  world  of  conflict  rises  into  view.  These  con- 


ETHICAL   SIGNIFICANCE   OF   THE   TRAGEDIES       359 

flicts  are  precipitated  when  individual  passion,  pref- 
erence, or  love  is  set  in  opposition  to  the  family,  as 
in  "  Romeo  and  Juliet "  and  "  King  Lear " ;  and 
when  individual  will,  interest,  or  passion  is  set  in 
opposition  to  the  State,  as  in  the  historical  plays, 
and  in  "  Coriolanus,"  "Julius  Caesar,"  and  "Mac- 
beth." These  are  the  two  great  classes  of  tragic 
conflict  with  which  Shakespeare  deals ;  and  his 
point  of  view  is  consistent  throughout.  Society  is 
striving,  in  a  rude  and  halting  fashion,  toward  the 
attainment  of  harmony ;  its  institutions  are  often 
based  on  unrighteousness,  they  are  perverted  in 
their  uses  or  they  are  outgrown ;  in  each  case  some 
kind  of  conflict  is  inevitable  and  that  conflict  takes 
a  tragic  form.  These  institutions  impose  order 
upon  society;  to  that  order  each  individual  must 
adjust  himself,  and  in  it  he  must  find  his  place ;  if 
he  sets  his  will  against  the  general  will  as  organized 
in  these  institutions  he  precipitates  a  conflict  and  be- 
comes a  tragic  figure.  These  conflicts  are  not  casual 
and  accidental;  they  represent  the  working  out  of  the 
moral  and  institutional  order,  and  they  must,  there- 
fore, find  their  ultimate  issue  in  a  deeper  harmony. 

This  is  the  Shakespearian  interpretation  of  the 
tragic  collisions  of  society.  It  is  the  clearness  with 
which  Shakespeare  sees  and  represents  this  prin- 
ciple of  mediation,  this  process  of  reconciliation, 
which  gives  the  Tragedies  their  authority  as  works 
of  art  and  sets  the  dramatist  among  the  masters  of 
the  knowledge  of  life. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  ROMANCES 

IT  was  characteristic  of  Shakespeare  that  during 
the  years  in  which  the  Tragedies  were  written,  and 
while  he  was  meditating  upon  the  baffling  problem 
of  evil  in  the  world,  he  was  conducting  his  affairs 
with  prudence  and  sagacity.  The  sanity  of  his 
nature,  which  held  him  to  the  great  highways  of 
human  interest  and  rational  human  living,  kept  his 
genius  in  touch  with  reality  at  all  points  and  con- 
tributed not  a  little  to  the  richness  and  range  of  his 
creative  activity.  The  assumption  that  the  man  of 
imagination  cannot  be  a  man  of  practical  wisdom, 
and  that  there  is  an  inherent  antagonism  between 
genius  and  sound  judgment,  has  been  disproved 
many  times  in  the  history  of  all  the  arts,  and  per- 
sists in  the  face  of  convincing  historic  refutation. 
There  have  been  many  men  of  rare  and  beautiful 
gifts  who  have  lacked  the  capacity  to  deal  strongly 
or  intelligently  with  the  practical  side  of  life,  and 
who  have,  therefore,  been  unable  to  make  that 
adjustment  to  conditions  and  realities  which  is  part 
of  the  problem  of  life  and  a  chief  part  of  its  educa- 
tion. For  this  reason  many  men  of  noble  imagina- 

360 


THE   ROMANCES  361 

tion  have  missed  the  full  unfolding  of  their  genius 
and  the  complete  harvesting  of  its  fruits.  Shake- 
speare was  not  one  of  those  pathetic  figures  who, 
through  some  defect  in  spiritual  organization,  make 
splendid  tragic  failures  —  figures  with  whom  his 
imagination  was  always  busy,  and  who  appear  in 
nearly  all  the  plays.  He  was  the  sounder  and 
therefore  the  greater  poet  because  in  his  life,  as  in 
his  art,  he  held  the  balance  between  reality  and 
ideality ;  mounting  into  high  heaven  with  effortless 
wing,  like  the  lark  in  the  meadows  about  Stratford, 
but  returning  with  unerring  instinct  to  the  familiar 
and  solid  earth. 

During  the  decade  between  1600  and  1610, 
Shakespeare  was  adding  to  his  properties  at  Strat- 
ford, he  was  making  various  investments,  he  was 
seeking  to  recover  by  suits  at  law  moneys  loaned 
to  others,  and  he  was  steadily  increasing  his  income 
from  various  sources.  His  purchase  of  New  Place 
has  been  noted ;  upon  the  death  of  his  father  the 
houses  in  Henley  Street  came  into  his  possession, 
and  in  one  of  them  his  mother  probably  lived  until 
her  death  in  1608.  He  enlarged  by  purchase  the 
grounds  of  New  Place ;  he  acquired  a  property  of 
nearly  a  hundred  and  fifty  acres  in  the  neighbour- 
hood of  Stratford ;  he  purchased  an  interest  in  the 
tithes  of  Stratford,  Welcombe,  and  Bishopton ;  and, 
both  at  Stratford  and  in  London,  he  brought  suits 
for  the  recovery  of  small  debts.  Like  his  father,  he 
appears  to  have  had  no  aversion  to  litigation ;  but, 


362  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

on  the  other  hand,  there  is  nothing  in  the  various 
records  of  the  legal  proceedings  which  he  inaugu- 
rated, to  show  that  he  was  oppressive  or  unjust  to 
those  with  whom  he  had  business  dealings.  In 
practical  affairs  he  was  sagacious,  orderly,  and  busi- 
nesslike. That  a  poet  collected  a  debt  which  was 
due  him  hardly  furnishes  rational  ground  for  the 
theory  that  he  must  therefore  have  been  a  hard 
and  grasping  person. 

To  the  Tragedies  succeeded  a  group  of  three 
plays  which  Dr.  Dowden  has  happily  classed  as 
Romances,  which  completed  Shakespeare's  work 
as  a  dramatist  and  which  hold  a  place  by  them- 
selves. It  is  true  that  "Henry  VIII."  came  at 
the  very  end,  but  this  spectacular  play  is  Shake- 
speare's only  in  part,  and  is  hardly  to  be  counted 
among  his  representative  and  original  works. 

A  new  note  was  struck  in  the  romances,  and 
that  note  is  distinctly  sounded  in  "  Pericles,"  a  play 
which  is  of  Shakespearian  authorship  only  in  its 
most  poetic  passages.  It  seems  to  predict  "  The 
Tempest,"  "  Cymbeline,"  "The  Winter's  Tale,"  as 
"  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona  "  predicts 
"Twelfth  Night."  Marina  is  of  the  same  exqui- 
site order  of  womanhood  as  Miranda  and  Perdita. 
The  poet's  work  on  this  drama  was  done  when 
the  period  of  tragedy  was  drawing  to  a  close  but 
was  not  yet  at  an  end.  The  play  probably  appeared 
about  1607,  and  was  probably  completed  by  some 
playwright  of  inferior  taste  and  ability.  The 


364  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

plot  was  derived  from  various  sources ;  the  story 
being  one  of  great  antiquity  and  having  been 
very  widely  popular  for  several  centuries  before 
Shakespeare's  time.  It  had  been  read  on  the  Con- 
tinent in  the  "  Gesta  Romanorum,"  and  in  England 
in  Gower's  "  Confessio  Amantis  "  ;  and  it  was  retold 
in  a  prose  romance  by  Lawrence  Twine,  which 
appeared  in  England  in  1576.  There  is  now  sub- 
stantial agreement  that  the  repellent  parts  of  "  Peri- 
cles "  were  written  by  another  hand  than  Shake- 
speare's, and  that  to  his  genius  is  due  the  exquis- 
ite episode  and  romance  of  Marina,  conceived  and 
worked  out  with  a  delicacy  of  feeling,  a  refinement 
of  sentiment,  and  a  pervading  atmosphere  of  poetry 
which  are  unmistakably  Shakespearian. 

"  Cymbeline  "  was  included  among  the  Tragedies 
by  the  editors  of  the  First  Folio  ;  but  its  pervading 
spirit  and  its  peaceful  and  happy  ending  place  it 
among  the  Romances.  Shakespeare  had  passed 
through  the  period  of  tragedy  into  a  deep  and  abid- 
ing peace,  but  the  gayety  of  the  earlier  mood  of  the 
Comedies  was  no  longer  possible.  However  serene 
and  calm  the  spirit  of  the  poet,  he  could  never 
again  look  at  life  without  seeing  the  element  of 
tragedy  at  work  in  it.  That  element  became  sub- 
ordinate and  served  chiefly  to  bring  out  certain 
gracious  and  beautiful  qualities  of  nature,  certain 
pure  and  almost  spiritual  personalities,  but  it  was 
henceforth  part  of  the  mysterious  experience  of  life 
to  one  who  had  sounded  the  depths  of  Hamlet's 


THE   ROMANCES  365 

solitary  melancholy  and  been  abroad  when  all  the 
fury  of  the  elemental  passions  burst  upon  the  head 
of  Lear.  In  "  Cymbeline,"  "The  Winter's  Tale," 
and  "  The  Tempest,"  the  tragic  motive  is  intro- 
duced, and  the  tragic  conflict  would  have  worked 
out  its  inevitable  wreckage  if  these  later  dramas 
had  not  been  plays  of  reconciliation ;  plays,  that  is, 
in  which  the  movement  of  the  tragic  forces  is 
arrested  by  repentance,  by  the  return,  through  peni- 
tence, to  the  true  order  of  life.  In  these  conclud- 
ing dramas  the  destructive  forces,  which  run  their 
course  in  the  Tragedies,  are  set  in  motion  in  order 
that  they  may  furnish  a  background  for  the  pres- 
entation of  the  healing  and  restoring  power  of 
remorse,  penitence,  reconciliation,  forgiveness,  and 
atonement.  The  dewy  freshness  of  the  world  in 
"  The  Winter's  Tale  "  and  "  The  Tempest  "  is  more 
penetrating  in  its  unstained  purity  because  the 
lightning  still  plays  from  the  clouds  which  are  fast 
dissolving  along  the  horizon. 

Shakespeare  was  a  dramatist  during  the  period 
when  his  work  touched  its  highest  points  of  achieve- 
ment, and  it  betrays  the  absence  of  even  rudimen- 
tary critical  instinct  to  identify  a  dramatist  with  the 
wide  range  of  characters  which  his  imagination  cre- 
ates in  a  purely  objective  mood.  There  are  indi- 
vidual plays  from  which  it  would  be  an  impertinence 
to  attempt  to  infer  the  ethical  attitude  or  the  per- 
sonality of  Shakespeare.  On  the  other  hand,  it 
must  also  be  remembered  that  Shakespeare  was  a 


366  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

poet  before  and  after  the  dramatic  period ;  that  the 
mask  was  not  so  consistently  worn  during  the  period 
of  the  Sonnets  and  of  the  Romances  as  during  that 
of  the  Tragedies ;  that  he  left  a  large  body  of  work 
behind  him,  and  that  through  this  work  there  run 
certain  consistent  and  fundamental  conceptions  of 
life  and  character ;  that  this  work,  conceding  uncer- 
tainty with  regard  to  the  exact  chronology  of  each 
play,  can  be  divided  into  four  distinct  periods. 
These  facts  have  a  bearing  on  the  nature  of  Shake- 
speare's personality  and  experience  which  it  is  as 
uncritical  to  disregard  as  it  is  uncritical  to  hold 
Shakespeare  morally  responsible  for  any  sentiment 
put  in  the  mouths  of  lago  and  Richard  III.  How- 
ever much  or  little  the  facts  in  Shakespeare's  ex- 
perience may  have  had  to  do  with  his  work  as  a 
creative  artist,  it  is  beyond  question  that  he  passed 
through  distinct  stages  of  artistic  and  intellectual 
unfolding;  and,  accepting  the  psychology  of  genius, 
the  history  of  the  man  of  genius  as  it  has  been  re- 
corded in  every  art,  and  the  revelation  of  the  man 
of  genius  as  it  has  been  made  by  himself,  Goethe 
serving  as  an  example,  it  is  rational  to  believe  that 
the  man  and  the  artist  in  Shakespeare  were  in  vital 
relationship  from  the  beginning  to  the  end. 

In  his  life  of  sustained  productivity  Shakespeare 
passed  through  four  periods :  a  period  of  appren- 
ticeship, when  he  was  learning  both  his  trade  and 
his  art ;  a  period  of  joyous  and  many-sided  contact 
with  the  world  and  with  men,  during  which  he  made 


THE   ROMANCES  367 

his  approach  to  life ;  the  period  of  the  Tragedies, 
when  he  entered  into  life,  sounded  its  depths  of 
experience,  and  faced  its  problems ;  and  a  period  of 
reconciliation  or  mediation,  when  the  tragic  ele- 
ments found  their  place  in  a  comprehensive  and 
beneficent  order.  Out  of  this  rich  and  vital  con- 
tact with  life  the  poet  came  at  last  into  a  mood  at 
once  serene,  grave,  and  tender;  he  looked  upon 
men  with  a  deep  and  beautiful  pity ;  fortitude  under 
calamity,  charity  for  human  weakness,  faith  in  the 
power  of  human  sweetness  and  purity,  pervade  the 
Romances  and  give  them  an  interior  beauty  of  which 
the  exquisite  poetry  in  which  they  are  steeped  seems 
only  an  outward  vesture.  That  beauty  was  the  re- 
flection of  a  nature  of  great  richness,  which,  through 
deep  and  searching  experience,  had  at  last  found 
peace  in  a  wide  vision,  a  catholic  spirit,  and  a  rev- 
erent faith  in  purity,  goodness,  and  truth. 

In  these  latest  plays  the  poet  shows  also  a  great 
sense  of  freedom ;  a  consciousness  of  inward  power 
matched  with  outward  skill  which  justifies  him  in 
becoming  a  law  unto  himself.  The  style  is  subor- 
dinated to  the  thought ;  rhyme  almost  disappears ; 
weak  endings  increase  in  number ;  the  iambic  regu- 
larity of  the  blank  verse  is  varied  by  new  flexibility ; 
the  harmony  of  the  line  is  subordinated  to  that  of 
the  paragraph,  and  the  music  of  the  verse  gains  a 
richer  and  fuller  movement ;  and  there  is  complete 
indifference  to  the  traditional  unities  of  time  and 
place.  These  traditions  had  been  modified  or  dis- 


368  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

carded  at  an  early  date,  but  in  the  Romances  a  new 
kind  of  unity  is  introduced,  or  at  least  illustrated,  in 
an  art  so  convincing  that  the  mind  accepts  the  new 
order  of  construction  as  if  it  were  the  order  of  na- 
ture. "  The  ideality  of  space  which  characterized 
the  English  stage  of  that  time,"  writes  Professor 
Ten  Brink,  "  and  of  which  the  ideality  of  time  was  a 
necessary  corollary,  the  ability  of  the  prevailing 
drama  to  include  a  long  chain  of  events  throughout 
its  entire  course,  permitted  Shakespeare  in  tragedy 
to  follow  his  inner  bent,  which  impelled  him  to  the 
psychological  side  of  his  subject.  It  permitted  him 
to  represent,  as  he  loved  to  do,  the  evolution  of  a 
passion  from  its  first  beginnings  to  its  climax ;  and 
not  seldom  reaching  still  further  back,  to  show  us 
the  soil  in  which  it  was  to  take  root.  It  permitted 
him  to  show  us  a  character  unfolding  before  our 
eyes  under  the  reciprocal  influence  of  deed  and 
experience,  of  action  and  environment.  It  enabled 
him  thus  in  his  tragedies  to  lay  the  chief  weight 
upon  the  connection  between  the  character  and  the 
acts  of  the  tragic  hero,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing, 
to  devote  the  best  part  of  his  powers  and  endeav- 
ours to  the  dramatic  unfolding  of  his  characters." 

In  the  Tragedies  this  loosening  of  the  bonds  of 
time  and  place  enabled  Shakespeare  to  lay  bare  the 
very  heart  of  the  tragic  conflict ;  in  the  Romances 
it  made  it  possible  to  bring  together,  for  the  full 
disclosure  of  the  drama  of  mediation,  distant  coun- 
tries and  times ;  to  bring  within  the  compass  of  a 


THE   ROMANCES  369 

play  the  most  exquisite  poetry  and  the  most  rugged 
prose  ;  to  set  on  the  same  stage  Perdita  and  Autoly- 
cus,  Miranda  and  Caliban. 

"  Cymbeline "  marks  the  end  of  the  period  of 
tragedy,  and  the  dominance  of  a  new  mood.  It 
probably  appeared  about  1609.  Dr.  Forman,  to 
whom  reference  has  already  been  made,  who  com- 
bined the  arts  of  a  quack  with  the  taste  of  a  thea- 
tre-goer, ^and  whose  brief  diary  is  an  interesting 
contemporary  record,  saw  the  play  at  the  Globe 
Theatre,  but  made  no  record  of  the  date.  The  plot 
was  drawn  from  various  sources,  and  these  diverse 
materials  were  fused  and  combined  by  the  dramatist 
with  a  free  hand. 

The  story  of  Cymbeline  and  of  his  two  sons  was 
taken  from  Holinshed;  the  story  of  Imogen  from 
Boccaccio's  "  Decameron " ;  while  some  details  of 
the  plot  suggest  that  Shakespeare  drew  upon  well- 
known  and  oft-used  motives  of  current  fairy  tales. 
To  this  source  he -was  probably  indebted  for  some 
of  the  most  delicate  and  poetic  touches  in  the  life  of 
Imogen  with  her  brothers  in  the  cave  of  Belarius. 
This  rude  but  hospitable  home,  full  of  kingly  grace 
and  nobleness  in  woodland  disguise,  is  set  in  strik- 
ing contrast  to  the  court  from  which  Imogen  has 
fled.  In  this  secluded  cavern  courage  and  integrity 
are  preserved  and  trained  against  the  day  when 
they  must  bring  in  the  new  order,  of  which  Imogen 
is  the  stainless  and  appealing  protagonist  No 
lovelier  image  of  chaste,  self-sacrificing  womanhood 

2B 


370  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

is  to  be  found  in  the  whole  range  of  poetry.  The 
poet  has  invested  her  with  purity  as  with  a  garment 
which  she  wears  without  consciousness  either  of  its 
value  or  its  perishableness.  It  is  so  much  a  part  of 
her  nature  that  she  could  not  separate  it  from  her- 
self. Her  presence  touches  the  rough  lives  of  her 
brothers,  and  all  their  virtues  shine  through  the 
disguise  they  wear.  She  mediates  between  her 
father  and  Belarius ;  and  she  reconciles  Cymbeline 
and  Posthumus.  Her  gentleness  is  emphasized  by 
the  savage  temper,  the  hard  spirit,  which  run 
through  the  play,  and  which  at  the  end,  with  exqui- 
site skill,  are  resolved  into  harmony  by  her  spirit. 
Among  all  Shakespeare's  lyrics  there  is  none  more 
noble  than  "  Fear  no  more  the  heat  of  the  sun," 
which  is  set  like  a  gem  in  this  drama  of  a  woman's 
constancy. 

Robert  Greene  had  done  what  he  could,  when 
Shakespeare  was  serving  his  apprenticeship,  to  ar- 
rest the  growing  reputation  of  the  young  dramatist, 
and  had  failed.  A  "  Groatsworth  of  Wit  bought 
with  a  Million  of  Repentance  "  is  of  interest  now 
chiefly  because  of  the  reference  to  the  poet  which 
was  meant  to  do  him  harm,  but  which  has  served  to 
settle  some  interesting  questions  of  time,  and  to 
show  that  he  had  been  successful  enough  to  awaken 
envy.  In  1588,  five  years  before  the  attack  on 
Shakespeare,  Greene  brought  out  a  story  which, 
under  the  unattractive  title  of  "  Pandosto :  the 
Triumph  of  Time,"  became  one  of  the  most  popular 


THE   ROMANCES  371 

novels  of  the  day,  passing  through  at  least  fourteen 
editions.      Its  claims  upon  the  interest  of  readers 


THE   GUILD    CHAPEL    PORCH. 


were  set  forth  on  the  title-page :  "  Wherein  is  dis- 
covered by  a  pleasant  history,  that  although  by  the 
means  of  sinister  fortune,  Truth  may  be  concealed, 
yet  by  Time  in  spite  of  fortune  it  is  most  manifestly 


372  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

revealed  :  pleasant  for  age  to  avoid  drowsy  thoughts, 
profitable  for  youth  to  eschew  other  wanton  pas- 
times, and  bringing  to  both  a  desired  content. 
Temporis  filia  veritas"  Time,  if  not  in  itself  a 
mediating  principle,  is  a  necessary  element  in  the 
work  of  mediation ;  and  this  old-fashioned  romance 
furnished  both  the  tragic  introduction  and  the 
happy  and  peaceful  issue  upon  which  Shakespeare's 
mind  fastened  after  the  period  of  the  Tragedies. 
His  hand  saved  Greene's  story  from  oblivion  ;  it  will 
always  be  remembered  as  the  source  from  which 
"  The  Winter's  Tale "  was  largely  drawn.  The 
tale  in  the  "Decameron,"  in  which  Shakespeare 
had  found  suggestions  for  parts  of  "  Cymbeline," 
was  also  laid  under  contribution  in  "  The  Winter's 
Tale."  Autolycus  was  the  last  of  a  long  list  of 
jesters  who  had  no  literary  progenitors  and  have 
left  no  successors;  they  are  the  creatures  of  the 
play  and  overflow  of  Shakespeare's  humour,  his 
perception  of  the  comic,  his  delight  in  contrasts 
and  contradictions,  with  touches  at  times  —  as  in 
the  Fool  in  "King  Lear"  —  of  fathomless  pathos. 
So  far  as  the  name  is  concerned,  Autolycus  was 
of  historic  ancestry. 

The  witty  thief  could  claim  divine  ancestry, 
and  Shakespeare  may  have  found  this  representa- 
tive rascal  in  the  pages  of  his  Ovid.  From  these 
hints  of  classical  characterization  the  poet  expanded 
the  rustic  knavery,  shrewdness,  and  inimitable 


THE   ROMANCES  373 

self-assurance  of  this  picturesque  picker-up  of 
other  people's  savings  at  country  festivals  and 
fairs. 

Shakespeare  accepted  Greene's  geography  with 
delightful  indifference  to  its  accuracy,  and  so  fell 
into  the  historic  blunder  of  giving  Bohemia  a  sea- 
coast.  Ben  Jonson  was  quick  to  fall  upon  this 
mistake,  not  so  much  from  malice  or  ill-feeling, 
probably,  as  from  the  natural  irritation  of  a 
careful  and  exact  mind  with  a  person  of  such 
marvellous  spontaneity  and  such  semi-humorous 
indifference  to  details  as  Shakespeare.  "  Shake- 
speare wanted  art  and  sometimes  sense,"  Drum- 
mond  of  Hawthornden  reports  him  as  saying ; 
"for  Shakespeare  in  a  play  brought  in  a  number 
of  men  saying  they  had  suffered  shipwreck  in 
Bohemia,  where  there  is  no  sea  near  by  some 
hundred  miles."  Shakespeare  may  have  known 
this  fact  as  definitely  as  Jonson  knew  it;  or  he 
may  have  been  as  ignorant  of  it  as  were  many 
other  well-informed  men  of  his  time.  His  interest, 
it  is  clear,  was  fastened  upon  facts  of  another  order, 
and  in  a  play  in  which  the  unity  of  time  was  set  at 
naught  by  an  interval  of  sixteen  years  between  two 
acts,  and  the  congruities  of  history  are  quietly 
ignored  in  order  to  secure  a  free  field  for  a  masterly 
drama  of  the  imagination,  geographical  accuracy 
was  a  small  matter. 

The  play  was  produced  about  1611.     It  was  put 


374  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

upon  the  stage  of  the  Globe  Theatre  on  the  i5th 
of  May  in  that  year,  on  which  occasion  Dr.  Forman 
was  present  and  described  it  at  some  length  in  his 
"  Book  of  Plays  and  Notes  thereof."  In  November 
of  the  same  year  it  was  performed  before  the  Court 
in  the  palace  at  Whitehall ;  and  two  years  later  it 
was  one  of  the  plays  chosen  for  presentation  in  the 
elaborate  festivities  with  which  the  marriage  of  the 
Princess  Elizabeth  was  celebrated. 

The  early  popularity  of  the  play  among  theatre- 
goers has  not  been  revived  in  modern  times.  Its 
essentially  poetic  quality  has  made  "  The  Winter's 
Tale,"  to  modern  taste,  a  reading  rather  than  an 
acting  play;  a  drama  of  the  imagination  rather  than 
of  real  life.  The  pastoral  world  in  which  Perdita 
moves  was  the  last  of  those  lovely  pastoral  worlds 
which  Shakespeare  created  as  refuges  from  the 
world  of  reality  and  places  of  reconciliation  between 
the  ideals  and  hopes  of  beautiful  natures  and  the 
actualities  which  surrounded  them. 

Perdita  is  half  woman  and  half  creature  of  fairy- 
land ;  in  her  rare  and  exquisite  spirit  there  is  a 
subtle  affiliation  with  nature  which  allies  her  with  the 
flowers,  whose  succession  she  has  set  in  an  immor- 
tal calendar ;  in  her  sweet  and  patient  devotion  she 
personifies  that  spirit  of  goodness  which  in  the  end 
binds  the  shattered  parts  of  her  world  into  unity 
once  more.  In  her  speech,  with  its  beguiling  mel- 
ody and  its  enchanting  imagery,  she  is  the  personi- 


THE   ROMANCES  375 

fication  of  poetry.  Among  the  Shakespearian 
women  she  represents  the  "  eternal  feminine  "  in  its 
most  poetic  aspect ;  for  she  mediates,  not  only 
between  conflicting  persons,  but  between  nature 
and  man. 

In  power  of  pure  invention,  of  creating  plots,  sit- 
uations, and  episodes,  Shakespeare  was  inferior  to 
several  of  his  contemporaries ;  and  if  invention  and 
originality  were  synonymous,  as  they  are  often 
taken  to  be,  his  rank  would  be  below  that  of  Jon- 
son,  Fletcher,  Marston,  or  Middleton.  The  fac- 
ulty of  invention  is,  however,  of  small  importance 
unless  it  be  sustained  by  force  of  mind  and  inspired 
and  directed  by  imagination.  Many  playwrights 
of  the  third  or  fourth  tank  have  shown  more 
fertility  in  inventing  fresh  situations  and  inci- 
dents than  Shakespeare ;  none  of  them  has  ap- 
proached him  in  originality.  For  originality  does 
not  consist  in  invention,  but  in  insight,  grasp,  selec- 
tion, arrangement,  and,  above  all,  in  vitalization. 
The  creative  faculty  does  not  disclose  itself  in  dex- 
terity or  multiplicity  of  invention,  but  -in  the  play  of 
free,  elemental  power.  "  The  great  merit,  it  seems 
to  me,  of  the  old  painters,"  wrote  Mr.  Lowell,  "  was 
that  they  did  not  try  to  be  original."  "  To  say 
a  thing  that  everybody  has  said  before,"  said 
Goethe,  "  as  quietly  as  if  nobody  had  ever  said  it, 
that  is  originality." 

Throughout  his  entire  productive  life,  Shake- 
speare kept  himself  in  closest  touch  with  the  expe- 


3/6  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

rience  of  the  race  as  that  experience  lies  written  in 
history  and  biography,  and  with  the  imaginative  life 
of  the  race  as  that  life  has  expressed  itself  in  strik- 
ing and  significant  figures,  and  in  stories  full  of 
deep  human  feeling  for  humour  or  for  poetry. 

He  knew  the  two  chroniclers  who  were  most 
popular  in  his  time ;  he  was  familiar  with  Plutarch 
and  with  some  of  the  notable  contemporary  trans- 
lators ;  he  had  intimate  acquaintance  with  such 
collections  of  stories  as  Paynter's  "  Palace  of  Pleas- 
ure " ;  and  he  read  the  novels  or  tales  of  his  age 
with  an  artist's  feeling  for  the  truth  of  life  or  of 
poetry  which  they  contained.  He  lived  freely  and 
deeply  in  his  time ;  indifferent  to  conventionalities 
save  as  they  conformed  to  his  conception  of  sane 
living,  and  to  literary  traditions  save  as  they  har- 
monized with  his  artistic  instinct  and  intelligence. 
His  greatness  as  a  poet  lies  in  his  extraordinary 
genius  for  seeing  the  concrete  fact,  and  in  his  unri- 
valled power  of  irradiating  that  fact  with  the  insight 
and  vision  of  the  imagination.  No  man  of  his  time 
exhibited  such  fertility  and  audacity  of  imagination, 
and  no  man  so  firmly  based  his  artistic  work  on 
clear,  uncompromising  perception  of  actualities. 
He  was  at  the  same  time  the  closest  observer  and 
the  most  daring  idealist  of  his  age.  Through  each 
successive  period  of  his  productive  career  he 
touched  phase  after  phase  of  experience  and  pre- 
sented a  long  succession  of  characters.  Beginning 
with  the  old  chronicle  plays,  which  he  read  with 


THE  ROMANCES  377 

the  truest  historical  perception  and  feeling,  he 
passed  on  to  the  humorous  aspects  of  life,  and 
thence  to  a  study  of  its  most  appalling  aspects ;  and 
at  each  stage  he  laid  hold  upon  some  human  docu- 
ment in  history,  legend,  tradition,  or  romance.  He 
never  lost  his  touch  with  the  realities  of  life ;  and 
he  found  so  much  that  was  of  supreme  significance 
that  he  rarely  had  occasion  to  use  invention.  The 
race  in  many  lands  and  at  many  periods  of  time 
had  been  at  work  storing  up  the  raw  material  of 
poetry  for  him ;  he  entered  into  partnership  with 
the  race,  and,  by  rationalizing  its  experience  and 
giving  it  the  beauty  and  order  of  art,  repaid  the 
race  a  thousand  fold  for  the  material  of  every  sort 
which  had  been  placed  in  his  hands.  In  this  mas- 
terful dealing,  not  with  images  of  his  own  making, 
but  with  the  actualities  of  human  experience,  is  to 
be  found  his  originality  —  an  originality  identical 
in  its  method  and  operation  with  the  originality  of 
Homer,  Dante,  and  Goethe,  who  share  with  him 
the  splendid  loneliness  of  supreme  literary  achieve- 
ment. 

In  "  The  Tempest "  Shakespeare  used  existing 
material  only  in  the  remotest  way;  the  play  fash- 
ioned itself  largely  in  his  imagination.  In  the  earlier 
dramas  he  had  dealt  entirely  with  past  conditions 
and  incidents ;  the  "  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor "  is 
the  only  one  of  his  works  which  may  be  said  to 
deal  with  contemporary  society  and  manners.  "  The 
Tempest,"  however,  so  far  as  it  was  rooted  in  real- 


378  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

ity,  was  drawn  by  suggestion  from  stirring  events 
in  his  own  time.  The  poet,  more  than  any  of  his 
contemporaries,  personified  the  freedom,  vitality, 
keen  sense  of  reality,  and  wide  discursive  interests 
of  the  Elizabethan  age ;  in  "  The  Tempest "  he 
touched  the  new  world  of  wonder,  adventure,  and 
achievement  fast  coming  to  the  knowledge  of  the 
old  world.  Strange  tidings  of  new  countries  and 
peoples  were  coming  up  from  time  to  time  from  the 
far  seas,  and  marvellous  stories  of  strange  lands  and 
perilous  voyages  were  told  by  quiet  English  fire- 
sides. In  the  autumn  of  1610  a  great  sensation 
was  made  in  London  by  the  arrival  of  a  company 
of  sailors  who  had  been  wrecked  off  the  Bermudas, 
until  that  moment  undiscovered.  These  sailors, 
like  all  men  of  their  occupation,  were  lovers  of  mar- 
vels and  spinners  of  strange  tales ;  they  had  found 
the  climate  of  the  Bermudas  charming,  and  they 
had  heard  many  inexplicable  sounds  in  the  islands. 
These  experiences  were  not  dulled  in  colour  by  the 
homeward  voyage ;  on  the  contrary,  they  gained  in 
marvellous  and  mysterious  accompaniments  of  sight 
and  sound  as  the  distance  lengthened  between  the 
place  where  they  befell  the  wrecked  crew  and  the 
places  in  which  they  were  heard  with  eager  and 
uncritical  ears. 

The  wreck  of  the  Sea-Venture,  Sir  George 
Somers  commanding,  was  described  at  length  by 
several  survivors,  the  most  important  of  these 
accounts  being  that  entitled  "  A  Discovery  of  the 


THE    ROMANCES  379 

Bermudas,  otherwise  called  the  He  of  Divels," 
which  was  reenforced  by  several  pamphlets.  Ac- 
cording to  these  reports  the  island  of  Bermudas 
had  never  been  "  inhabited  by  any  Christian  or 
heathen  people " ;  it  was  reported  "  a  most  pro- 
digious and  enchanted  place,"  "  still-vexed "  with 
"  monstrous  thunder-storms  and  tempests."  On 
the  night  the  ship  was  wrecked  the  Admiral 
himself  "  had  an  apparition  of  a  little,  round  light, 
like  a  faint  star,  trembling  and  streaming  along 
with  a  sparkling  blaze,  half  the  height  above  the 
main-mast,  and  shooting  sometimes  from  shroud 
to  shroud,  tempting  to  settle  as  it  were  upon  any 
of  the  four  shrouds." 

The  stories  of  this  marvellous  voyage  were 
undoubtedly  heard  by  Shakespeare,  and  he  cer- 
tainly read  these  narratives  before  writing  of  the 
"still-vexed  Bermoothes,"  of  the  climate  of  the 
Island  in  "  The  Tempest,"  and  of  the  spirits  which 
frequented  it.  Traces  of  the  reading  of  other 
books  of  travel  are  found  in  the  play.  It  is  pos- 
sible also  that  Shakespeare  may  have  heard  from 
English  actors,  who  had  performed  at  Nuremberg 
a  few  years  before  this  time,  the  plot  of  a  comedy 
written  by  Jacob  Ayrer,  of  that  city,  under  the 
title  "  Die  Schone  Sidea."  It  is  also  possible 
that  there  may  have  been  an  earlier  play  or  novel 
of  a  somewhat  similar  plot,  which  has  entirely 
disappeared.  The  famous  description  of  an  ideal 
commonwealth  which  is  put  in  the  mouth  of  Gon- 


380  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

zalo  was  suggested  to  Shakespeare  by  an  essay 
of  Montaigne's  which  he  read  in  Florio's  transla- 
tion ;  while  the  Invocation  of  Prospero  may  owe 
something  to  one  of  Ovid's  "  Metamorphoses," 
with  which  the  poet  had  long  been  familiar. 

After  recognizing  his  indebtedness  for  certain 
details  to  various  earlier  and  contemporary  sources, 
"  The  Tempest "  remains  preeminently  the  crea- 
tion of  Shakespeare's  imagination.  In  certain 
respects  it  is  his  masterpiece.  As  a  drama  it 
falls  far  below  his  earlier  work ;  as  a  poem,  cast 
in  a  dramatic  form,  it  is  one  of  the  most  beautiful 
creations  in  English  poetry.  The  profound  medi- 
tativeness  and  rich  intellectual  quality  of  "  Ham- 
let "  are  fused  in  it  with  the  lovely  fancy  of  the 
"  Midsummer  Night's  Dream,"  while  in  deep  and 
sustained  play  of  imagination,  fashioning  the  play 
in  its  structure,  shaping  its  parts  to  one  high  end, 
touching  it  everywhere  with  a  kind  of  ultimate 
beauty,  it  stands  alone  not  only  in  Shakespeare's 
work  but  in  modern  poetry.  The  nobleness  of 
conception  is  matched  throughout  with  a  kindred 
nobleness  of  style ;  while  the  songs  are  full  of  the 
deep,  spontaneous  melody  which  issues  out  of 
the  heart  of  the  poet  when  sound  and  sense  are 
perfectly  mated  in  his  imagination. 

The  profound  seriousness  of  temper  which  per- 
vades the  play,  the  clearness  with  which  its  ethical 
bearings  are  disclosed,  the  deep  philosophy  which 
underlies  it,  convey  an  irresistible  impression  of 


THE   ROMANCES 


381 


THE 

TEMPEST. 


showli 


der  then  the  weather, 


j     ^±^Y'O;f-fwr.:K". 

i  £E£*2     Pttr.'.  Hew«  Mailer:  W)uurh«rc> 

J|>3     At*l.  GooJ.-Sp«kc(otl.1M.iri,i«'*:  fa! 


Lu-t!« 


lue-<  agrou 


P.S,  c-hevrely,  checfely  my  hart*  : 
etoppj-t'ilc  :  Tend  to  th'MaltcTs 
buttl  thv  \vinde  ,  if  roome  e  • 


GOH  ulf,nnii  others, 

Mm.  Good  Botcfwainc  luue  caie  :  \vhere*s  the  Ma- 
fteT?l->|aythemen. 

"SffJ'.  I  priynow  Jierpctvlow. 

Jtth.  Where  is  the  M.iftrr,  Bofon  ? 

50^/TDoycuiiothMrehim  ?  you  marrc  our  labour, 
Kecpeyour  tahines  :you  doafsift  thetlorme.  • 

Co««..Niy,  good  be  patient. 

Batef.  When  the  Sea  is  :  hence,  what  cares  thefe  roa- 
rers for  the  name  of  King?  to  Cibinej  filence  :  trouble 
vsriflt. 

Gen.  Good,  yet  remember  whom  thou  haft  aboord. 

Botef.  None  that  I  more  loue  then  my  fcK'e.  You  arc 
a  Counfeilor,ifyou  can  command  thefe  Elements  to  (1- 
lence,  and  worke  thcpeate  of  the  prcfent,  wee  will  not 
hand  a  rope  more,  vie  your  authorise:  Ifvou  cannot, 
|iue  tlunkesyou  haueliu'dlb  long,  and  make  your 
telfe  readie  in  your  Cabme  for  the  mifchancc  of  the 
houre,  ifit  fohap.  Checrely  good  hearts  :  out  of  our 


ay  I  fay. 
Gin.  I  ha 


or  tnir  ofijce:  yet  jgairtc  ?  U  lut  <Jo  ycu  Iseerc^  Shal  we 

Sfi>jf.  A  pone  o'yourthrciat,you  bawling,  bhfphc- 
mous  inc  haritabic1  Dog. 

'Butef.  Worke  you  then. 

^wA.Uang  cur,hang,you  whorcfon  infoJent  Noyfe- 

makcr,  \vearc  Icfiestrjij  to  be  drownde.then  thou  art. 

Cftaifj.  lie  warrant  him  for  drowning,  (hough  the 

j   Ship  \verc  no  ftrcmger  then  a  Nutt-fhelL  and  as  leaky  as 

|    an  vnAmdicd  wench. 

Botrf.  Ljy  hera  hold,  a  hold  ,  ftt  hertwo  courfes  off 
to  Sea  againe.Iay  her  off. 

Enter  Jlfuriaert  tret. 

Mjarl  All  ioft.to  prayers,toprayfrs,all  loft. 
'Betef.  What  muft  our  mouths  be  cold  ? 
Goirt.The  King,  and  Prince,at  pr;iyerj,let'j  aflifl  them, 
forour  cafe  is  a?  theits. 
Sr6*f.  1'am  out  of  patience. 

An.  We  are  meerly  cheated  of  our  lines  by  drunkards, 
This  wide-chopt-rafcall,  would  thou  mightft  lye  drow- 
ning the  waffling  of  ten  Tides. 

Con*,.  Hec'l  be  hang'd  yet, 
Though  euery  drop  of  water  fweare  againft  it. 
And  gape  atwidft  to  glut  him.     stfenfiijeti  ncjfi  w.'iiin. 
Met  cy  on  vs. 

We  lplit,we  fplit  ,  Farewell  my  wife,  and  children, 
Fat  ewell  brother  :  w<  fplit.we  tplit,wc  fpiit. 
Jtntb.  Let's  all  fmke  with'  King 
Stb.  Let's  take  leaue  of  him.          .  Exit. 

Goaf-.  Now  would  I  giuc  a  thoufind  furlongs  of  Sea, 
for  an  Acre  of  barren  ground;  Long  heath,  Browne 
ills  aboiie  be  done,  butl  would 
Ex-it. 


Gin.  I  haue  great  comfort  from  this  {ellow:methinks 
hehathnodrowningmarkevponhim,  his  complexion 
uperfefl  Gallowes  ;  ftandfaft  good  Fate  to  his  ban. 
ging,  make  the  rope  of  hisdeftiny  our  cable,  forour 
ownedothlittleaduantage:  Ifhcbe  not  borne  tobee 
hang'd,  our  cafe  is  miferable.  .  Exit. 

Enter  ftleftvaioe. 

B»w/TOowne  with  the  top.  M»ft  ryare,lowcr  .lower, 
bring  her  to  Try  with  Mainc-courfe.  A  pl*g"e  - 

Atrj  within.  Enter  Settftum^atkoaie  d"  gonub. 


firrs,  any  thing:  the 
faine  dye  a  dry  death. 


Scena  Secuhda. 


Eater  frvjpera  ami  Mi'-'od"- 
M,rj.  If  by  your  Art(mv  dccretl  father; you  haue 
Put  the  wild  waterj  in  this  Rore;«by  them: 
The  skye  it  leemcs  would  powrc  down  ftinkingpitth, 
But  that  the  Sea.mounting  to  th*  welkins  cheeke, 
Da(he5  the  fire  out.  Oh !  I  haue  fufferr  d 
With  thofc that  1  faw  fuffer:  A  braue  vcffel! 

A  (Who 


FACSIMILE  OF  THK   FIRST   PAGE   OF   "THE  TEMPEST"   IN  THE  FOLIO   OF    1623. 


382  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

something  personal  in  the  theme  and  the  treat- 
ment. It  is  impossible  to  read  "  The  Tempest " 
without  a  haunting  sense  of  secondary  meaning. 
Caliban,  Miranda,  and  Prospero  have  been  inter- 
preted from  many  points  of  view;  a  final  and  con- 
vincing interpretation  will  never  be  made,  but  the 
instinctive  feeling  of  Shakespeare's  readers  and 
lovers  that  in  this  last  play  from  his  hand  the  poet 
was  bidding  farewell  to  his  art  is  probably  sound. 
As  a  rule,  critics  err  rather  in  diminishing  than 
expanding  the  significance  of  great  works  of  art. 

"The  Tempest"  appeared  about  1611.  Shake- 
speare was  then  forty-seven  years  of  age,  and  had 
nearly  completed  his  work.  When  he  set  the 
noble  figure  of  Prospero  on  the  unknown  island, 
and  made  him  master  of  spirits  and  of  men,  with 
a  knowledge  of  life  which  was  so  great  that  it 
easily  passed  on  into  magical  art,  he  could  not 
have  been  oblivious  of  the  spiritual  significance 
of  the  work,  nor  of  its  deep  and  vital  symbolism 
in  the  development  of  his  own  mind  and  art. 

The  success  of  "  The  Tempest "  appears  to  have 
been  great ;  it  was  presented  at  Court,  and  was  one 
of  the  plays  performed  during  the  marriage  festivi- 
ties of  the  Princess  Elizabeth  in  1613.  One 
source  of  this  popular  interest  was  probably  the 
charm  of  the  songs  which  gave  the  movement 
pause  and  relief.  There  is  good  reason  to  believe 
that  these  songs  were  set  to  music  by  Robert 
Johnson,  a  popular  composer  of  the  day,  and 


THE  ROMANCES  383 

that  two  of  them  had  been  preserved  in  Wil- 
son's "  Cheerful  Ayres  and  Ballads  set  for  Three 
Voices." 

Shakespeare  completed  no  more  plays  after  the 
appearance  of  "  The  Tempest,"  but  he  had  a  shap- 
ing hand  in  "  Henry  VIII.,"  which  appeared  about 
1612  and  is  included  among  his  works.  This 
very  uneven  and  very  spectacular  drama  is  based 
upon  material  found  in  Hall  and  Holinshed,  in 
a  life  of  Wolsey  by  George  Cavendish,  then  in 
manuscript,  and  in  Foxe's  "  Acts  and  Monu- 
ments of  the  Church."  Its  performance  on  June  29, 
1613,  led  to  the  burning  of  the  Globe  Theatre 
—  an  event  of  which  there  are  several  contem- 
porary accounts.  The  play  was  presented  with 
unprecedented  elaboration  in  scenery  and  dress  — 
a  first  attempt,  apparently,  in  the  direction  of  the 
splendour  of  appointments  which  characterizes  the 
modern  stage.  "  Now  King  Henry  making  a 
Masque  at  the  Cardinal  Woolsey's  House,"  writes 
Wotton,  "  and  certain  Canons  being  shot  off  at  his 
entry,  some  of  the  paper  or  other  stuff  wherewith 
one  of  them  was  stopped,  did  light  on  the  Thatch, 
where  being  thought  at  first  but  an  idle  smoak, 
and  their  eyes  Vnore  attentive  to  the  show,  it 
kindled  inwardly,  and  rah  round  like  a  train,  con- 
suming within  less  than  an  hour  the  whole  House 
to  the  very  grounds.  This  was  the  fatal  period  of 
that  virtuous  fabrique ;  wherein  yet  nothing  did 
perish,  but  wood  and  straw  and  a  few  forsaken 


384  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

cloaks."  And  the  old  chronicler  of  this  first  of 
many  similar  catastrophes  adds  with  naive  humour: 
"  Only  one  man  had  his  breeches  set  on  fire,  that 
would  perhaps  have  broyled  him,  if  he  had  not  by 
the  benefit  of  a  provident  wit  put  out  with  bottle 
ale.  " 

Attention  was  directed  in  the  last  century  to  cer- 
tain peculiarities  of  versification  in  "  Henry  VIII.," 
but  it  was  not  until  the  middle  of  the  present  cen- 
tury that  Mr.  Spedding  set  forth  at  length  the 
theory  that  the  play  was  Shakespeare's  in  part 
only,  and  that  many  passages  were  in  the  manner 
of  Fletcher.  It  is  interesting  that  these  differences 
in  style  were  recognized  clearly,  not  by  scholars, 
but  by  two  men  of  sensitive  literary  feeling,  Tenny- 
son and  Emerson.  The  English  poet  first  made 
the  suggestion  to  Mr.  Spedding.  Emerson's  com- 
ments on  the  matter  are  full  of  insight : 

"In  Henry  VIII.  I  think  I  see  plainly  the  crop- 
ping out  of  the  original  work  on  which  his  own 
finer  stratum  was  laid.  The  first  play  was  written 
by  a  superior,  thoughtful  man,  with  a  vicious  ear. 
I  can  mark  his  lines,  and  know  well  their  cadence. 
See  Wolsey's  soliloquy,  and  the  following  scene 
with  Cromwell,  where,  instead  of  the  metre  of 
Shakespeare,  whose  secret  is  that  the  thought  con- 
structs the  tune,  so  that  reading  for  the  sense  will 
bring  out  the  rhythm  —  here  the  lines  are  con- 
structed on  a  given  tune,  and  the  verse  has  even  a 
trace  of  pulpit  eloquence.  But  the  play  contains 


THE   ROMANCES  385 

through  all  its  length  unmistakable  traits  of  Shake- 
peare's  hand,  and  some  passages,  as  the  account  of 
the  coronation,  are  like  autographs." 

The  view,  presented  with  great  skill  by  Mr.  Sped- 
ding,  that  Shakespeare  intended  to  make  a  "  great 
historical  drama  on  the  subject  of  Henry  VIII., 
which  would  have  included  the  divorce  of  Katha- 
rine, the  fall  of  Wolsey,  the  rise  of  Cranmer,  the 
coronation  of  Anne  Bullen,  and  the  final  separation 
of  the  English  from  the  Roman  Church ;  "  that 
he  worked  on  the  two  first  acts,  and  that,  for  some 
unknown  reason  the  manuscript  was  passed  on  to 
Fletcher,  who  expanded  it  into  the  play  as  we  now 
have  it,  has  been  accepted  by  many  students  of  the 
play.  The  three  chief  figures  —  the  King,  Queen 
Katharine,  and  the  Cardinal  —  are  unmistakably 
Shakespeare's  in  conception ;  and  the  trial  scene 
is  certainly  his. 

There  are  traces  of  Shakespeare's  hand  in  the 
"  Two  Noble  Kinsmen,"  which  the  title-page  de- 
clares was  written  by  u  Mr.  John  Fletcher  and 
Mr.  William  Shakespeare,  Gentlemen,"  and  the 
play  appears  in  some  editions  of  the  poet's  works. 
It  is  impossible,  however,  to  decide  with  any  cer- 
tainty the  extent  of  Shakespeare's  contribution  to  a 
drama  which  in  many  parts  is  clearly  the  produc- 
tion of  another  hand.  It  is  not  improbable,  as  has 
been  suggested  by  some  authorities,  that  when 
Shakespeare  withdrew  from  active  work  in  his  'pro- 
fession he  may  have  left  some  preliminary  sketches 

2C 


386  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

for  half-finished  dramas  behind  him,  and  that  it  fell 
to  the  lot  of  Fletcher  or  some  other  contemporary 
dramatist  to  work  over  and  complete  what  the  poet 
had  begun.  With  the  writing  of  "  Cymbeline  "  and 
"  The  Tempest "  Shakespeare's  work  ended. 


CHAPTER   XVII 

THE  LAST  YEARS  AT  STRATFORD 

IT  is  impossible  to  overlook  the  recurrence  of  cer- 
tain incidents  and  the  reappearance  of  certain  figures 
in  the  Romances.  "  Pericles,"  "  Cymbeline,"  "  The 
Winter's  Tale,"  and  "  The  Tempest "  are  all  dramas 
of  reconciliation ;  tragic  events  occur  in  each  of 
these  plays  and  tragic  forces  are  set  in  motion,  but 
the  tragic  movement  is  arrested  by  confession  and 
repentance  and  the  tragic  forces  are  dissipated  or 
turned  to  peaceful  ends  by  meditation  and  reconcil- 
iation. Coming  close  upon  the  long-sustained 
absorption  in  tragic  motives,  the  singular  unity  of 
the  Romances  in  organizing  conception,  in  serenity 
of  mood,  and  in  faith  in  purity  and  goodness  and 
love  as  solvents  of  the  problems  of  life,  make  it 
impossible  to  escape  the  conclusion  that  the  later 
plays  record  and  express  the  final  attitude  of  the 
poet  towards  the  ultimate  questions  of  life. 

The  chief  figures  in  the  Romances  are  men  and 
women  who  have  borne  heavy  sorrows  —  Prospero, 
Hermione,  Imogen,  Pericles,  and  the  fair  young 
creatures  whose  purity  and  sweetness  typify  the 
immortal  qualities  of  youth  —  Marina,  Miranda, 

387 


388  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

Perdita,  Florizel,  Ferdinand,  and  the  brothers  of 
Imogen.  Behind  these  suffering  or  radiant  figures 
there  is,  in  each  play,  a  pastoral  background  of  ex- 
quisite loveliness ;  a  landscape  so  noble  and  serene 
that  it  throws  the  corruption  of  courts  and  of  soci- 
ety into  striking  relief.  In  each  play  there  is  a  trace 
of  the  old  fairy  story  —  the  story  of  the  lost  prince 
or  princess,  condemned  to  exile,  disguise,  or  servi- 
tude ;  and  in  the  end  the  lost  are  found,  disguises 
are  thrown  off,  evil  plots  are  exposed  and  evil  plot- 
ters brought  to  repentance  ;  suffering  is  recognized 
and  finds  its  sweet  reward  in  the  rebuilding  of  its 
shattered  world  on  a  sure  foundation,  and  youth 
finds  eager  expectation  merged  in  present  happi- 
ness. Prospero  does  not  break  his  magic  staff  or 
drown  his  book  until  he  has  reknit  the  order  of  life 
shattered  in  the  Tragedies,  and  reunited  the  wisdom 
of  long  observation  and  mature  knowledge  with  the 
fresh  heart  and  the  noble  idealism  of  youth. 

In  such  a  mood  Shakespeare  returned  to  Strat- 
ford about  1611.  He  was  forty-seven  years  of  age, 
and  therefore  at  the  full  maturity  of  his  great  pow- 
ers. From  the  standpoint  of  to-day  he  was  still  a 
young  man ;  but  men  grew  old  much  earlier  three 
centuries  ago.  The  poet  had  been  in  London 
twenty-five  years,  and  had  written  thirty-six  or 
thirty-seven  plays,  and  a  group  of  lyric  poems.  He 
was  still  in  his  prime,  but  he  had  lived  through  the 
whole  range  of  experience,  he  was  a  man  of  consid- 
erable fortune,  and  he  nad  a  wholesome  ambition  to 


THE  LAST  ¥EARS  AT  STRATFORD      389 

become  a  country  gentleman,  with  the  independence, 
ease,  and  respect  with  which  landed  proprietorship 
has  always  been  regarded  in  England. 

His  sources  of  income  had  been  his  plays,  which 
were  paid  for,  in  his  earlier  years,  at  rates  varying 
from  twenty-five  to  sixty  dollars  —  equivalent  in 
present  values  to  two  hundred  and  fifty  and  six 
hundred  dollars  ;  his  salary  as  an  actor,  which  was 
probably  not  less  than  five  hundred  dollars  a  year, 
or  about  three  thousand  dollars  in  present  values ; 
the  returns  from  the  sale  of  his  poems,  which  ran 
through  many  editions,  and  the  profits  of  which  his 
publisher  undoubtedly  divided  with  him  on  some 
acceptable  basis ;  and,  most  important  of  all,  his 
revenue  from  his  shares  in  the  Blackfriars  and  Globe 
theatres. 

The  Globe  Theatre  provided  room  for  an  audi- 
ence of  about  two  thousand  people,  and  for  a  num- 
ber of  years  before  its  destruction  by  fire  in  1613 
was  almost  continuously  prosperous.  The  trans- 
ference of  public  interest  to  the  boy  actors,  though 
long  enough  to  send  Shakespeare's  company  into 
the  provinces,  was  comparatively  short-lived.  It  is 
estimated  that  the  annual  receipts  of  the  Globe 
Theatre  did  not  fall  below  the  very  considerable  sum 
of  two  hundred  thousand  dollars  in  current  values. 
After  providing  for  the  maintenance  of  the  theatre, 
there  must  have  remained  a  substantial  profit. 
This  profit  was  divided  among  the  shareholders, 
among  whom  were  Shakespeare,  Burbage,  Condell, 


390 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


Heminge,  and  Philips ;  all  were  actors  and  mem- 
bers of  the  company,  and  combined  personal  interest 
and  practical  knowledge  in  theatrical  management. 
The  profits  of  the  Blackfriars  Theatre  were  smaller. 
Shakespeare's  great  popularity  after  1598  or  1600 
^.^2  probably  enabled  him  to 
secure  much  larger  re- 
turns from  the  sale  of 
new  plays  than  were  paid 
to  the  majority  of  play- 
wrights ;  while  the  fees 
always  distributed  at 
Court  performances  must 
have  amounted,  in  his 
case,  to  a  very  consider- 
able sum.  From  these 
various  sources  Shake- 
speare probably  received, 
during  the  later  years  of 
his  life,  not  less  than 
fifteen  thousand  dollars 
a  year  in  current  values. 
Mr.  Lee,  who  has  made  a 
thorough  investigation  of  the  subject,  thinks  there 
is  no  inherent  improbability  in  the  tradition,  re- 
ported by  a  vicar  of  Stratford  in  the  following 
century,  that  Shakespeare  "spent  at  the  rate  of  a 
thousand  a  year." 

The  poet  had  become  the  owner  of  various  prop- 
erties   at  Stratford  or  in  its  neighbourhood     The 


SHAKESPEARE'S  SIGNATURE. 


THE  LAST   YEARS   AT   STRATFORD  391 

houses  in  Henley  Street  had  come  into  his  posses- 
sion. The  house  at  New  Place,  in  which  he  took 
up  his  residence,  was  a  commodious  aW  substantial 
building;  and  the  grounds,  with  the  exception  of  a 
thin  wedge  of  land  on  Chapel  Lane,  extended  almost 
to  the  Avon.  His  circumstances  were  those  of  a 
country  gentleman  of  ample  income. 

When  Shakespeare  left  London,  he  probably 
withdrew  from  participation  in  the  management  of 
the  two  theatres  in  which  he  was  a  shareholder,  but 
his  plays  continued  to  be  presented.  His  popularity 
suffered  no  eclipse  until  the  fortunes  of  the  stage 
began  to  yield  to  the  rising  tide  of  Puritan  senti- 
ment. During  the  festivities  attending  the  marriage 
of  the  Princess  Elizabeth,  seven  of  his  plays  were 
presented  at  Whitehall.  That  he  made  the  three 
days'  journey  to  London  at  short  intervals  and  kept 
up  his  old  associations  is  practically  certain. 

His  son  Hamnet  had  died  in  the  summer  of  1 596 ; 
his  father  died  in  the  early  autumn  of  1601,  and 
his  mother  in  September,  1608.  When  he  took  up 
his  residence  in  Stratford  in  1611,  his  wife  and  two 
daughters  constituted  his  family.  The  eldest 
daughter,  Susannah,  had  married,  in  June,  1607, 
Dr.  John  Hall,  a  physician  of  unusual  promise,  who 
became  at  a  later  day  a  man  of  very  high  standing 
and  wide  acquaintance  in  Warwickshire.  The 
house  in  which  he  lived  is  one  of  the  most 
picturesque  buildings  which  have  survived  from 
the  Stratford  of  Shakespeare's  time.  Dr.  Hall's 


392  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

daughter,  Elizabeth,  the  only  granddaughter  of  the 
poet,  was  born  in  1608.  Mrs.  Hall  made  her  home 
in  her  later  years  at  New  Place  ;  there,  in  1643,  she 
entertained  Queen  Henrietta  Maria ;  and  there,  in 
1649,  she  died.  In  the  inscription  on  her  grave  in 
the  churchyard  of  Holy  Trinity  both  her  father  and 
husband  are  described  as  "  gentlemen."  Of  her  it 
was  written : 

Witty  above  her  sexe,  but  that's  not  all, 
Wise  to  Salvation  was  good  Mistress  Hall. 
Something  of  Shakespeare  was  in  that,  but  this 
Wholly  of  him  with  whom  she's  now  in  blisse. 

Her  daughter  Elizabeth  married  Thomas  Nashe,  a 
Stratford  man  of  education,  and,  after  his  death, 
John  Barnard,  who  was  knighted  by  Charles  II. 
soon  after  the  Restoration.  Lady  Barnard,  who 
was  the  last  direct  descendant  of  the  poet,  died  in 
1670.  She  had  come  into  possession,  by  various 
bequests,  of  New  Place,  the  Henley  Street  houses, 
the  land  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Stratford,  and  a 
house  in  Blackfriars  purchased  by  Shakespeare  in 
1613.  The  houses  in  Henley  Street  passed  at  her 
death  into  the  possession  of  the  grandson  of  Shake- 
speare's sister  Joan,  and  remained  in  the  family,  as 
reported  in  a  previous  chapter,  until  the  present 
century.  New  Place  was  sold  after  Lady  Barnard's 
death,  and  subsequently  came  again  into  the  hands 
of  the  Clopton  family. 

Judith  Shakespeare    married,  shortly  before  her 


THE   LAST    YEARS   AT    STRATFORD 


393 


father's  death  in  1616,  Thomas  Quiney,  a  wine- 
dealer  of  Stratford,  and  lived  for  thirty-six  years  in 
a  house  still  standing  at  the  southeast  corner  of 
High  and  Bridge  streets  in  Stratford.  It  was 
known  at  that  time  as  The  Cage,  because  it  had 


THE   DINING-HALL   AT   CLOPTON. 


been  used  at  an  earlier  period  as  a  prison.  The 
foundation  walls  of  this  ancient  house  are  four  feet 
in  thickness ;  books  and  Shakespearian  souvenirs 
of  every  kind  are  now  sold  in  the  shop  on  the 
ground  floor.  Judith  Shakespeare  had  three  sons, 
all  of  whom  died  in  infancy  or  early  youth.  She 


394  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

survived  her  family  and  her  sister  Susannah,  and 
died  in  1661,  at  the  age  of  seventy-six. 

The  records  show  that  after  his  retirement  to 
Stratford  Shakespeare  continued  to  give  careful 
attention  to  his  affairs  and  to  take  part  in  local 
movements.  In  1613  he  bought  the  house  in 
Blackfriars,  not  far  from  the  theatre,  which  subse- 
quently passed  into  the  possession  of  Lady  Barnard. 
The  deeds  of  conveyance,  bearing  Shakespeare's 
signature,  are  still  in  existence.  Comment  has 
sometimes  been  made  on  the  fact  that  the  poet 
spelled  his  name  in  different  ways,  and  that  other 
people  spelled  it  with  complete  disregard  of  consist- 
ency, and  it  has  been  inferred  that  he  must  have 
been,  therefore,  an  ignorant  person.  A  little  investi- 
gation would  have  shown  that  in  the  poet's  time 
there  was  great  variation  in  the  spelling  of  proper 
names.  Men  of  the  eminence  of  Sidney,  Spenser, 
Jonson,  and  Dekker  were  guilty  of  the  same  latitude 
of  practice  in  this  matter,  and  even  Bacon,  on  one 
occasion  at  least,  spelled  his  name  Bakon. 

Shakespeare's  friend  John  Combe,  at  his  death 
in  1614,  left  the  poet  a  small  bequest  in  money  and 
a  legal  entanglement.  The  attempt  of  Combe's 
son  to  enclose  certain  fields  at  Welcombe  which 
had  long  been  common  was  vigorously  opposed  by 
the  corporation  of  Stratford.  Both  as  the  owner  of 
neighbouring  property  and  as  joint  owner  of  the 
tithes  of  old  Stratford,  Welcombe,  and  Bishopton, 
Shakespeare  had  an  interest  in  the  matter  which 


THE   LAST   YEARS   At   STRATFORD  39$ 

arrayed  him  at  the  start  in  active  opposition  to  the 
plan  to  enclose  the  property.  A  record  in  the 
diary  of  Thomas  Greene,  the  town  clerk  of  Strat- 
ford, shows  that  Shakespeare  was  an  influential 
person  in  the  dispute,  and  that  he  was  in  London 
in  the  autumn  of  1614. 

There  is  reason  to  believe  that  Puritanism  had 
gained  many  adherents  in  Stratford,  and  that  the 
poet's  son-in-law,  Dr.  Hall,  was  in  sympathy  with 
the  movement.  The  town  records  indicate  that 
in  1614  a  clergyman  was  entertained  at  New 
Place  ;  the  entry  is  suggestive  of  hospitality :  "  Item, 
for  one  quart  of  sack  and  one  quart  of  clarett  wine 
geven  to  a  preacher  at  New  Place,  xxd."  It  is 
probable  that  the  preacher  was  a  Puritan,  but  the 
fact  furnishes  no  clew  to  Shakespeare's  ecclesiastical 
leanings.  Aside  from  the  bent  of  his  mind  and  his 
view  of  life,  so  clearly  disclosed  in  the  plays,  he 
could  hardly  have  been  in  sympathy  with  the  Puri- 
tan attitude  towards  his  own  profession.  The 
temper  of  Stratford  had  changed  greatly  since  the 
days  when,  as  a  boy,  he  saw  the  companies  of 
players  receive  open-handed  hospitality  at  the  hands 
of  the  town  officials.  Two  years  earlier,  in  1612, 
the  town  council  had  passed  a  resolution  declaring 
that  plays  were  unlawful  and  "  against  the  example 
of  other  well-governed  cities  and  boroughs,"  and 
imposing  a  penalty  on  players. 

Early  in  1616  Shakespeare  had  a  draft  of  his  will 
prepared,  and  this  document,  after  revision,  was 


396 


WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 


signed  in  March.  On  Tuesday,  April  23,  he  died; 
and  two  days  later  he  was  buried  inside  the  chancel 
of  Holy  Trinity  Church,  near  the  northern  wall. 
Over  his  grave  were  cut  in  the  stone  lines  that 
have  become  familiar  throughout  the  English-speak- 
ing world : 

Good  friend,  for  Jesus'  sake  forebeare 
To  dig  the  dust  enclosed  heare  ; 
Bleste  be  the  man  that  spares  these  stones, 
And  curst  be  he  that  moves  my  bones. 


THE    INSCRIPTION    OVER   THE 


William  Hall,  who  visited  Stratford  in  1694,  de- 
clared that  these  words  were  written  by  the  poet  to 
protect  his  dust  from  clerks  and  sextons,  "  for  the 
most  part  a  very  ignorant  set  of  people,"  who  might 
otherwise  have  consigned  that  dust  to  the  charnel- 
house  which  was  close  at  hand.  The  verse,  by 
whomever  written,  has  accomplished  its  purpose, 
and  the  sacred  dust  has  never  been  disturbed. 


THE  LAST  YEARS  AT  STRATFORD 


397 


With  a  single  exception,  the  line  of  graves  which 
extends  across  the  chancel  pavement  is  given  up 
to  members  of  the  poet's  family.  His  wife,  his 
daughter  Susannah  and  her  husband,  and  his 
granddaughter  Elizabeth's  first  husband,  Thomas 
Nashe,  lie  together  behind  the  chancel  rail  in  the 
venerable  church  which  has  become,  to  the  English- 
speaking  world,  the  mausoleum  of  its  greatest  poet. 
Shakespeare's  father  and  mother  were  buried  within 
the  church,  but  their  graves  have  not  been  located. 


GRAVE   OF   WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE. 


His  daughter  Judith  and  his  son  Hamnet  undoubt- 
edly lie  within  the  walls  of  the  church  or  of  the  ancient 
burying-ground  which  surrounds  it.  His  brother  Ed- 
mund, who  was  a  player,  was  buried  in  St.  Saviour's 
Church,  Southwark,  in  the  heart  of  modern  London. 
His  brother  Richard,  who  died  in  his  early  prime  at 
Stratford  in  1613,  was  probably  buried  in  the 
churchyard  of  Holy  Trinity.  His  brother  Gilbert 


398  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

lived  to  a  good  age,  and  no  record    of   his    death 
or   burial    has    been    discovered. 

Shakespeare's  will,  written  on  three  sheets  of 
paper,  and  signed  at  the  bottom  of  each  page, 
begins  with  the  conventional  phrases,  bears  a 
number  of  erasures  and  interlineations,  and  the 
three  signatures  indicate  great  weakness.  Under 
its  provisions  the  poet's  wife  received  his  second- 
best  bed  with  its  furnishings ;  his  daughter  Susannah 
inherited  the  greater  part  of  the  estate,  including 
New  Place,  the  properties  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
Stratford,  and  the  house  in  Blackfriars,  London ; 
and  she  and  her  husband  were  made  executors  and 
residuary  legatees.  To  his  younger  daughter  Judith, 
who  married  Thomas  Quiney  earlier  in  the  same 
year,  he  left  a  small  property  on  Chapel  Lane  and 
money  to  an  amount  equal  to  about  eight  thousand 
dollars  in  current  values,  and  certain  pieces  of  plate. 
Bequests  were  made  to  his  sister  Joan  and  her 
three  sons.  To  several  of  his  Stratford  friends, 
and  to  his  old  associates  or  "fellows"  in  London, 
John  Heminge,  Richard  Burbage,  and  Henry  Con- 
dell,  small  sums  of  money  were  bequeathed  for  the 
purchase  of  memorial  rings.  His  godson,  William 
Walker,  was  remembered,  and  a  sum  of  money 
equivalent  to  about  three  hundred  dollars  in  pres- 
ent values  was  left  to  the  poor  of  Stratford.  The 
omission  of  Shakespeare's  wife  from  the  distribution 
of  his  estate  under  the  terms  of  his  will  has  been 
accepted  by  some  writers  as  evidence  of  the  poet's 


THE  LAST  YEARS  AT  STRATFORD 


399 


waning  regard ;  the  most  reasonable  inference  from 
his  action  is  that  Dr.  Hall,  who  was  a  man  of  un- 
usual capacity,  could  be  trusted  to  care  for  his 
wife's  mother  with  more  assurance  than  she  could 
be  left  to  manage  her  own  affairs.  She  survived 
her  husband  seven  years,  dying  on  August  6,  1623. 
The  Latin  verses  inscribed  upon  her  tomb  are 
affectionate  in  tone,  and  were  probably  written  by 
Dr.  Hall. 


MEERE  LYETR4NTERRED  TIE  BO^y   OFN^.WiFE 

OF*  WIIXIAM  SHAKESPEARE,  WHO  BEETED  -THIS  LIFE  TH 

fi&XX  OfAvGVllCxS BEING  OF  TFE  AGE  6F-<a7-YEARES 

"  VBerar{fu  ni^er^u  iac-vifanic^  dedi^i  /- 
H    ^fe  mtfii :  pro  iarrto  muuere  saxa  dabo  g  ^ 
Quam majttem;Xmoueat  lapideiii, bonus  Aiigl9.  ore 
•  .£xeat  .chnsii-  corpus  "/imaigo  tux-  VD^XD ^  • 
Sed-trrt  ^votA^yalent  :venias  cito  CKri^e/refufief 
€ki]^4  licit  tumulo  mater  :et  Ast FA  petet, 


INSCRIPTION    OVER   THE   GRAVE   OF   SHAKESPEARE'S    WIFE. 

On  the  north  wall  of  the  chancel  of  Holy  Trinity, 
at  some  time  prior  to  1623,  the  half-length  bust  of 
Shakespeare  by  Gerard  Jonson,  to  which  reference 
has  been  made,  was  erected.  The  poet  is  repre- 
sented in  the  act  of  writing,  and  the  inscription 
reads  as  follows : 

Judicio  Pylium,  genio  Socratem,  arte  Maronem 
Terra  tegit,  populus  m&ret,  Olympus  habet. 

Stay,  passenger,  why  goest  thou  by  so  fast  ? 
Read,  if  thou  canst,  whom  envious  death  hath  plast 


400  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

Within  this  monument :  Shakespeare  :  with  whome 
Quick  Nature  dide  ;  whose  name  doth  deck  ye  tombe 
Far  more  than  cost ;  sieth  all  yt  he  hath  writt 
Leaves  living  art  but  page  to  serve  his  witt. 

Obiit  Ano.  Doi.  1616.  ^Etatis  jj.    Die  23.     Ap> 

The  bust  was  originally  coloured,  and  was  probably 
copied  from  a  mask  taken  after  death.  The  dress 
includes  a  scarlet  doublet  under  a  loose,  sleeveless 
black  gown.  As  a  work  of  art  the  bust  has  no 
merit;  its  interest  lies  in  the  fact  that,  despite  its 
crude  workmanship,  it  was  accepted  and  placed 
in  position  by  Shakespeare's  children.  It  was 
whitewashed  at  the  close  of  the  last  century,  but 
the  colours  have  been  restored  as  far  as  possible. 

The  most  important  of  the  various  portraits  of 
the  poet  is  that  made  by  Martin  Droeshout,  and 
printed  on  the  title-page  of  the  First  Folio  in  1623. 
The  engraver  was  a  man  of  Flemish  blood,  born 
in  London,  and  still  in  his  boyhood  when  Shake- 
speare died.  It  is  not  probable  that  he  ever  saw 
the  poet.  This  representation,  crude  as  it  is,  was 
accepted  by  Shakespeare's  friends  and  received  the 
commendation  of  Ben  Jonson.  When  Droeshout 
executed  the  engraving,  he  probably  had  before 
him  a  painting,  and  there  is  reason  to  believe  that 
this  painting  was  recently  brought  to  light  and  now 
hangs  in  the  Memorial  Picture  Gallery  at  Stratford. 
It  is  almost  a  facsimile  of  the  Droeshout  engraving, 
but  shows  some  artistic  skill  and  feeling. 

A  much  more  attractive   portrait  is  that  known 


THE  LAST  YEARS  AT  STRATFORD      40! 

as  the  "  Ely  House  "  portrait,  which  now  hangs  in 
the  Birthplace  at  Stratford,  and  was  formerly  the 
property  of  a  Bishop  of  Ely.  It  was  probably 
painted  early  in  the  seventeenth  century.  The 
well-known  Chandos  portrait,  which  hangs  in  the 
National  Portrait  Gallery  in  London,  shows  im- 
portant variations  from  the  bust  and  the  Droeshout 
engraving,  and  was  probably  painted  not  many 
years  after  the  poet's  death  from  descriptions  fur- 
nished by  his  friends  and  more  or  less  imaginative 
in  their  details.  Its  origin  is  unknown,  but  its 
history  has  been  traced.  It  was  at  one  time  the 
property  of  D'Avenant,  whose  father  was  landlord 
of  the  Crown  Inn  at  Oxford  in  Shakespeare's  time, 
and,  later,  of  Betterton,  Mrs.  Barry,  and  the  Duke 
of  Chandos,  becoming  the  property  of  the  nation 
about  the  middle  of  the  present  century.  The  Jan- 
sen  portrait  came  to  light  about  1770,  the  Zoust 
portrait  about  1725,  and  the  Felton  portrait  about 
1 792  ;  all  show  radical  variations  from  the  authen- 
ticated portraits.  The  portrait  bust  of  terra-cotta 
now  in  the  possession  of  the  Garrick  Club  was 
found  in  1845  in  a  wall  which  was  put  up  on  the 
site  of  the  Duke's  Theatre  built  by  D'Avenant 
Its  general  resemblance  to  other  portraits  furnishes 
the  only  basis  for  the  claim  that  it  reproduces  the 
features  of  Shakespeare.  The  Kesselstadt  death- 
mask,  found  in  a  junk-shop  in  Mayence  in  1849, 
resembles  a  portrait  in  the  possession  of  the  Kessel- 
stadt family,  but  neither  the  portrait  nor  the  mask 

2D 


402  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

has  been  satisfactorily  identified  as  a  representation 
of  the  poet  The  monument  in  the  Poets'  Corner 
in  Westminster  Abbey  was  placed  in  position  by 
popular  subscription  in  1741. 

The  most  enduring  memorial  of  Shakespeare 
was  the  complete  edition  of  his  works,  known  as 
the  First  Folio,  published  in  1623,  seven  years  after 
his  death.  His  early  narrative  poems,  "  Venus  and 
Adonis "  and  "  The  Rape  of  Lucrece,"  were  pub- 
lished under  his  direction  and  with  his  revision ; 
the  Sonnets  were  printed  without  his  sanction ; 
the  "  Passionate  Pilgrim  "  was  fraudulently  issued 
as  from  his  hand ;  while  of  the  sixteen  plays  which 
were  published  in  quarto  form  before  his  death,  it 
is  believed  that  none  was  issued  with  his  consent 
or  revision.  These  publications  were  speculative 
ventures,  and  the  text  presented  was  made  up 
either  from  reports  of  plays  taken  down  in  short- 
hand in  the  theatres,  from  separate  parts,  or  com- 
plete plays  surreptitiously  secured,  and  hurried 
through  the  press  without  correction.  Under  these 
conditions  the  opportunities  for  errors  of  all  kinds 
were  practically  without  number;  and  a  further 
and  prolific  source  of  error  was  found  in  the  cus- 
tom which  prevailed  in  the  old  printing-houses  of 
reading  the  matter  to  be  set  up  to  the  printers 
instead  of  placing  it  before  them.  The  surprising 
fact  about  the  text  of  the  Shakespearian  plays,  when 
these  circumstances  are  taken  into  consideration, 
is  not  that  the  difficulties,  obscurities,  and  uncer- 


THE   LAST   YEARS   AT   STRATFORD  403 

tainties    are   so    many,    but   that    they   are    so  few 
relatively  to  the  magnitude  of  his  work. 


POETS'    CORNER,    WESTMINSTER. 


In  1623  the  poet's  friends  and  fellow-actors,  John 
Heminge  and  Henry  Condell,  at  the  suggestion  of 
a  small  group  of  printers  and  publishers,  brought 
together  thirty-six  plays  under  the  three  divisions 


404  WILLIAM    SHAKESPEARE 

of  Comedies,  Histories,  and  Tragedies.  "  Pericles  " 
was  omitted.  The  title-page  declared  that  the 
plays  were  printed  "  according  to  the  true  original! 
copies  " ;  the  text  was  probably  that  of  the  acting 
versions  in  the  possession  of  the  company  with 
which  Shakespeare  had  been  associated,  in  which 
there  were  great  variations  from  the  dramatist's 
original  work.  For  this  reason  the  text  of  the 
First  Folio  is  in  many  places  inferior  to  that  of 
the  sixteen  quartos,  which,  although  surreptitiously 
issued,  gave  the  text  of  acting  versions  in  use  at  an 
earlier  date.  The  Droeshout  portrait  was  engraved 
on  the  title-page  of  the  First  Folio,  and  the  edition 
was  dedicated  to  William  Herbert,  Earl  of  Pem- 
broke, and  to  his  brother  Philip  Herbert,  Earl  of 
Montgomery.  The  editors  declared  that  their 
object  in  issuing  the  plays  in  this  form  was  to 
"  keepe  the  memory  of  so  worthy  a  friend  and 
fellow  alive  as  was  our  Shakespeare."  "  I  doubt," 
writes  Mr.  Lowell,  "  if  posterity  owes  a  greater  debt 
to  any  two  men  living  in  1623  than  to  the  two 
obscure  actors  who  in  that  year  published  the  first 
folio  edition  of  Shakespeare's  plays.  But  for  them 
it  is  more  than  likely  that  such  of  his  works  as  had 
remained  to  that  time  unprinted  would  have  been 
irrevocably  lost,  and  among  them  were  'Julius 
Csesar,'  '  The  Tempest,'  and  '  Macbeth.' " 

The  noble  eulogy  with  which  Ben  Jonson  enriched 
the  First  Folio  was  in  the  key  of  the  entire  body 
of  contemporary  comment  on  Shakespeare's  nature 


THE  LAST  YEARS  AT  STRATFORD      405 

and  character.  The  adjective  "sweet"  was  com- 
monly  applied  to  him ;  he  was  described  as 
"friendly,"  as  having  "a  civil  demeanour"  and 
"  an  open  and  free  nature " ;  and  tradition  later 
affirmed  that  he  was  "  very  good  company,  and  of 
a  very  ready  and  pleasant  smooth  wit."  The  two 
or  three  vague  traditions  of  irregularity  of  life  may 
be  dismissed  as  unsubstantiated.  The  standards  of 
his  time,  the  habits  of  his  profession,  the  circum- 
stances of  his  early  life,  and  the  autobiographic 
note  in  the  Sonnets  make  it  probable  that  in  his 
youth,  at  least,  he  was  not  impeccable.  That  he 
was  essentially  a  sound  man,  living  a  normal,  whole- 
some life,  is  rendered  practically  certain  by  his 
success  in  dealing  with  practical  affairs,  and  by  his 
long-sustained  power  of  producing  great  works  of 
art  on  the  highest  levels  of  thought  and  workman- 
ship. Such  industry,  sagacity,  and  thrift  as  Shake- 
speare showed  are  never  associated  with  disorderly 
living;  while  the  consistent  objectivity  of  his  atti- 
tude toward  life  is  impossible  to  any  man  whose 
moral  or  intellectual  sanity  is  seriously  impaired. 

Shakespeare's  resources,  both  material  and  spirit- 
ual, were  harvested  with  a  steady  hand.  While 
many  men  of  his  profession  wasted  their  means  and 
their  strength  in  disorderly  living,  he  invested  the 
money  earned  in  London  in  building  up  the  fortunes 
of  his  family  in  Stratford.  Generous  by  nature  and 
richly  endowed  with  imagination  and  passion,  he  was 
never  prodigal  either  of  his  genius  or  his  estate. 


406  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

Early  in  his  career  he  laid  the  foundations  of  a  solid 
prosperity,  and  when  he  had  secured  a  competence 
he  retired  from  active  work  to  enjoy  the  harvest  of 
a  diligent  and  well-ordered  life. 

Among  the  many  great  qualities  which  combined 
to  make  him  a  master  of  life  and  of  art,  sanity  must 
be  given  a  first  place  ;  and  sanity  is  as  much  a  mat- 
ter of  character  as  of  mind.  When  one  takes  into 
account  the  power  of  passion  that  was  in  him,  and 

t    .<•'••*"  :!.^<L>>^/4--~~       >    TI 
•r}  ..w-^/^'M-fa  /— -v' ..;. .  Jil 


y 
*** 


SHAKESPEARE'S  DEATH-RECORD. 


the  license  and  extravagance  of  his  time,  his  poise 
and  balance  become  as  marvellous  as  his  genius. 
He  avoided  as  if  by  instinct  those  eccentricities  of 
taste,  interest,  subject,  and  manner  to  which  many 
of  his  contemporaries  fell  victims,  and  which  men 
of  sensitive  imagination  often  mistake  for  evidences 
and  manifestations  of  genius. 

Shakespeare  kept  resolutely  to  the  main  high- 
ways of  life,  where  the  interest  of  the  great  human 
movement  is  always  deepest  and  richest  if  one  has 
adequate  range  of  vision.  He  dealt  with  the  ele- 
mental and  universal  experiences  in  broad,  simple, 


THE  LAST  YEARS  AT  STRATFORD      407 

vital  forms,  and  in  a  language  which  was  familiar 
and  yet  of  the  largest  compass.  There  was  nothing 
esoteric  in  his  thought  or  his  method ;  he  was  too 
great  to  depend  upon  secret  processes,  or  to  con- 
tent himself  with  any  degree  of  knowledge  short 
of  that  which  had  the  highest  power  of  diffusion. 
Although  the  keenest  of  practical  psychologists,  he 
did  not  concern  himself  with  curious  questions  of 
mental  condition,  nor  with  spiritual  problems  which 
are  elusive  and  subtle  rather  than  vital  and  pro- 
found. He  was  too  great  an  artist  to  mistake  psy- 
chological analysis,  however  skilful  and  interesting, 
for  literature. 

As  he  studied  life  and  passed  through  its  experi- 
ences he  saw  with  increasing  clearness  the  moral 
order  of  the  world,  the  ethical  relation  of  the  indi- 
vidual to  society  and  to  his  environment,  the  signifi- 
cance of  character  as  the  product  of  will,  and  the 
gradation  of  qualities  in  a  scale  of  spiritual  values. 
His  work  as  an  artist  deepened  and  widened  as  he 
grew  in  the  wisdom  of  life.  Such  wisdom,  and  its 
expression  in  work  of  sustained  power,  come  to 
those  only  whose  natures  are  harmonious  with  the 
fundamental  laws  of  life,  and  who  keep  themselves 
in  wholesome  relations  with  their  kind. 

Too  great  in  himself  to  become  a  cynic,  and  of  a 
vision  too  broad  and  penetrating  to  rest  in  any  kind 
of  pessimism,  Shakespeare  grew  in  charity  as  he  in- 
creased in  knowledge.  He  loved  much  because  he 
knew  men  so  well.  A  deep  and  tender  pity  was 


408  WILLIAM   SHAKESPEARE 

distilled  out  of  his  vast  experience,  and  his  last 
work  was  the  ripe  fruit  of  the  beautiful  humaniza- 
tion  of  his  genius  accomplished  in  him  by  the  disci- 
pline and  the  revelation  of  life  in  his  personal  history. 
"  The  Tempest "  and  "  The  Winter's  Tale,"  coming 
at  the  end  of  a  long  and  arduous  career,  are  the 
convincing  witnesses  of  the  harmony  of  life  and  art 
in  which  resides  the  secret  of  Shakespeare's  noble 
fertility  and  sustained  power.  The  path  which  led 
from  "  Titus  Andronicus  "  to  "  The  Tempest "  must 
have  been  one  of  gradual  but  unbroken  ascent.  To 
keep  in  one's  soul  the  freshness  of  perception  and 
imagination  which  touches  "  The  Tempest "  with 
the  light  that  never  fades,  one  must  be  great  in 
heart  and  in  life  as  well  as  in  creative  power. 
When  Prometheus  brought  the  arts  of  life  to  men, 
he  did  not  leave  them  skill  without  inspiration ;  he 
brought  them  hope  also.  Shakespeare's  genius, 
shining  on  the  darkest  ways,  seems  to  touch  the 
sky  beyond  the  horizon  with  light. 


CARVING   FROM    STALLS   OF  HOLY  TRINITY  CHURCH,    STRATFORD. 


INDEX 


Actor,  Shakespeare  as  an,  104, 118. 

Actors,  professional,  created  by  the 
Moralities,  16;  their  position  by  the 
middle  of  the  sixteenth  century,  78; 
Elizabeth  a  patron  of,  106 ;  Leicester's 
company  of,  106-108,  114;  a  perform- 
ance described,  109-111  ;  Shakespeare's 
name  on  lists  of,  117;  the  address  to, 
in  "  Hamlet,"  118 ;  opposition  of  the 
City  to,  128-131 ;  in  the  "  War  of  the 
Theatres,"  277-280,  310;  boys  as,  108, 
309-312,  389 ;  reference  in  "  Hamlet  " 
to  the  strife  between  boy  and  adult, 
310. 

Adam,  in  "As  You  Like  It"  played  by 
Shakespeare,  117. 

Adaptation  of  his  own  plays,  205,  262. 

Adaption  of  Plays  by  Shakespeare,  137, 
139-144,  148. 

Alleyne,  Edward,  the  star  of  the  Admi- 
ral's Men,  116. 

"  All's  Well  that  Ends  Well,"  source  of 
its  plot,  311-313;  alluded  to,  315. 

"A  Lover's  Complaint"  alluded  to 
among  the  poetical  writings  of  Shake- 
speare, 137,  177;  published  with  the 
Sonnets,  but  little  else  is  known  of  it, 
224. 

"  A  Midsummer's  Night's  Dream,"  War- 
wickshire in,  62;  alluded  to,  60,  95, 
177,  183,  381 ;  sources  of,  203 ;  metre, 
205 ;  the  great  popularity  of,  205. 

Analysis  of  special  characters  in  Shake- 
speare's plays:  Talbot,  154;  Biron, 
168;  Falstaff,  237-239,  263;  Shylock, 
252-254;  Jaques,  268;  Hamlet,  306- 
310;  Helena,  312,  313;  Othello,  322; 
Macbeth,  326-329;  Lear,  332,  333; 
Timon,  334;  Coriolanus,  340. 

Angelo,  Michael,  alluded  to,  195. 

"  Antony  and  Cleopatra,"  alluded  to,  304 ; 
the  source  of,  293,  335-338. 

Arden,  Mary.     See  Shakespeare,  Mary. 

Arden,  Robert,  of  Wilmcote,  grandfather 
of  the  poet,  33,  256. 


"  Arden    of    Feversham,"    credited    td 

Shakespeare  by  some  critics,  24. 
Armada,  the,  alluded  to,  24,  138. 
Armado  in  "  Love's  Labour's  Lost,"  166. 
"  Arte  of  English  Poesie,"by  Puttenham, 

102,  138. 
"As  You  Like  It,"  Warwickshire  in,  62, 

266;  Shakespeare  as  Adam  in,  117; 

its    plot,    etc.,    266-268;    alluded    to. 

170. 
Aubrey,  authority  for    the    report  that 

Shakespeare  assisted  his  father  after 

leaving  school,  51 ;  quoted,  95. 
Autographs  of  the  poet,  394. 
Ayrer,  Jacob,    379 ;    his  "  Die   Schone 

Sidea "  very  similar  in  plot  to  "  The 

Tempest,"  379. 

Bacon,  Francis,  Lord  Verulam,  portrait, 
312;  alluded  to,  394. 

Baker,  Mrs.,  late  custodian  of  the  Birth- 
place, 85. 

Bale,  — ,  author  of  "  King  Johan  "  and 
other  Chronicle  plays,  23. 

Ballad-dance,  the,  3. 

Bandello,  the  story  of  Romeo  and  Juliet 
in  a  " nouvelle"  by,  201 ;  some  of  the 
plot  of  "  Much  Ado  about  Nothing  " 
due  to,  265;  the  ultimate  source  of 
"  Twelfth  Night,"  270. 

Barnard,  Sir  John,  of  Abingdon,  second 
husband  of  Elizabeth  Hall,  the  poet's 
granddaughter,  258,  392. 

Barnfield,  Richard,  lines  by,  on  Shake- 
speare's "  Venus  "  and  "  Lucrece,"  196. 

Bear-baiting  Garden,  the,  illustration, 
117. 

Beaumont,  Francis,  alluded  to,  239  ;  por- 
trait of,  240 ;  lines  by,  on  the  Mermaid 
Tavern,  274. 

Belleforest,  the  story  of  Hamlet  in  the 
Histoires  Tragiques  of,  302. 

Bermudas,  the,  and  "The  Tempest,** 
378,  379- 

Bible,  Shakespeare's  study  of  the,  47. 


409 


4io 


INDEX 


Birthplace,  the,  of  Shakespeare,  illustra- 
tion, 31 ;  detailed  description  of,  35- 
37;  inherited  by  Shakespeare,  361, 
391;  by  his  daughter,  392;  by  his  sis- 
ter's grandson,  35,  392. 

Blackfriars,  Vautrollier  a  publisher  in, 
101 ;  Shakespeare's  house  in,  392,  394, 

397- 
Blackfriars  Theatre,  built  by  the   elder 

Burbage,  116;  secured  for  the  use  of 

the    Children    of    the    Chapel,    310; 

Shakespeare's  income  from,  389. 
Boccaccio,    the   source  of  "  All's  Well 

that  Ends  Well,"  312;  and  of  "  Cym- 

beline,"  369. 
Bond,  the  marriage,  of  Shakespeare  and 

Anne  Hathaway,  85,  86. 
Boy  actors,  108  ;  the  strife  between  adults 

and,  309-312,  389 ;  the  reference  to  in 

"  Hamlet,"  310. 
Brandes,  Mr.  Georg,  on  Shakespeare's 

visiting  Italy,  119-122. 
Brooke,  Arthur,  author    of   a   poetical 

version  of  the  story  of  "  Romeo  and 

Juliet,"  200. 
Burbage,  James,  actor  and  a  liveryman 

;.n  the  neighbourhood  of  Smithfield,  93, 

103;   a  Stratford  man  by  birth,  102: 

owner  of  The  Theatre,  103 ;  builder  of 

Blackfriars  Theatre,  116,  310. 
Burbage,  Richard,  son  of  James,  93, 103; 

a    member    of    the    King's    Players, 

108 ;  of  Shakespeare's  company,  116  ; 

builder   of  the    Globe   Theatre,   116, 

398  (?) ;  alluded  to,  279. 
Bushnell,  Dr.,  quoted,  251. 

Camden,  William,  280. 

Cavendish,  George,  383. 

Cecil,    Sir   Robert,  Raleigh's   letter   to, 

163. 
Chamberlain,  the  Lord,  his  company  of 

players,  116,  270. 
Chapman,    George,   portrait,    226;    his 

Homer,  229,  293,  317 ;  alluded  to,  216, 

225. 

Charlecote,  illustration  of,  67;  descrip- 
tion of,  67-70;  alluded  to,  52,  65,  74, 

82,  83. 
Charlecote  Church,  the  Lucy  monument 

in,  84. 

Charlecote  Park,  82. 
Charles  I.,  alluded  to,  99. 
Chaucer,  alluded    to,  20,  115,  192;    the 

seven-line  stanza  brought  from  France 


by,  192 ;  his  "  Canterbury  Tales,"  267, 
317. 

Chester,  Robert,  his  "  Love's  Martyr," 
containing  Shakespeare's  "The  Phoe- 
nix  and  the  Turtle,"  225. 

Chettle,  Henry,  publishes  Greene's  attack 
on  Shakespeare,  and  later  an  apology, 
159;  complains  of  the  poet's  silence 
after  the  death  of  Queen  Elizabeth, 
288. 

Children  of  the  Chapel,  310. 

Chronicle  plays,  23;  practically  cover  a 
period  of  four  centuries  of  English  his- 
tory, 24;  thoroughly  representative  in 
character,  149;  alluded  to,  230,  236, 
296. 

Chronology,  the,  of  Shakespeare's  plays, 
144,  148. 

Church,  the,  its  attitude  toward  the  play- 
ers of  the  Middle  Ages,  6;  its  own 
appeal  to  the  dramatic  instinct,  7 ;  its 
Mass  such  an  appeal,  7,  8  ;  its  tableaux 
of  New  Testament  scenes,  9 ;  neglected 
for  the  theatre,  131. 

Cinthio,  the  plot  of  "  Measure  for  Meas- 
ure "  in  a  novel  by,  316,  322. 

City,  the,  opposes  theatres,  130. 

Classical  stage,  the,  in  its  effect  on  Eng- 
lish art,  21,  172. 

Clopton,  74. 

Clopton  Bridge,  31,  39,324  (illustration). 

Clopton,  Sir  Hugh,  31,  74,  257. 

Clopton,  Sir  John,  74. 

Coleridge,  quoted  on  Shakespeare's  mo- 
rality, 174 ;  on  "  Venus  and  Adonis," 
193-195 ;  on  "  Macbeth,"  327. 

Combe,  John,  394. 

Comedy,  the  earliest  English,  19;  its 
earlier  development  as  compared  to 
tragedy  accounted  for,  21 ;  and  history, 
alternation  of  in  the  poet's  productions, 
235,  248 ;  Shakesperian,  defined,  250. 

Comedies  of  Shakespeare,  the,  248,  250; 
"  The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,"  261- 
265 ;  "  Much  Ado  about  Nothing,"  264- 
266;  "As  You  Like  It,"  266-268; 
"Twelfth  Night,"  268-270;  alluded  to, 

315.  344- 

Condell,  Henry,  one  of  the  editors  of  the 
First  Folio,  108,  403;  Shakespeare's 
bequest  to,  398 ;  alluded  to,  116. 

"  Coriolanus,"  290,  339-341 ;  source  of, 

339- 

Court,  the  poet's  relations  to,  198,  286, 320. 
Crown  Inn,  the,  at  Oxford,  92,  93,  401. 


INDEX 


411 


Curtain  Theatre,  one  of  the  two  in  exist- 
ence in  1586,  101 ;  the  only  rival  of 
The  Theatre,  108,  114. 

"  Cymbeline  "  included  among  Tragedies 
in  the  First  Folio,  364,  365 ;  source  of, 
364,  369,  372;  alluded  to,  363,  387. 

Daniel,  216. 

D'Avenant,  401. 

"  Decameron,"  the,  source  of  the  plot  of 
"  All's  Well  that  Ends  Well,"  312 ;  of 
"Cymbeline,"  369. 

Dekker,  229,  394, 

Dennis,  John,  quoted,  concerning  "  The 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,"  262. 

De  Quincey  on  "  Macbeth,"  328. 

Devereux,  Robert,  Earl  of  Essex,  285- 
288,  290;  portrait,  285;  alluded  to  in 
"  Henry  V.,"  286. 

Dionysus,  growth  of  the  myth,  2. 

"  Discourse  of  English  Poetrie,"  138. 

"  Downfall  of  Robert,  Earl  of  Hunting- 
ton,"  24. 

Drake,  Sir  Francis,  138. 

Drama,  the  early,  first  steps  in  its  growth, 
i;  the  myth,  2;  the  ballad-dance,  3; 
begins  in  worship,  4;  inevitable  in 
every  age,  4 ;  grew  vulgar  as  the  Ro- 
man populace  sank,  5 ;  condemned  by 
the  Church,  6;  developed  by  the  ap- 
peal of  the  Church  to  the  dramatic 
instinct,  7;  developed  also  by  scrip- 
tural tableaux,  9. 

Drama,  early  English,  the  Church  the 
chief  influence  in  making,  6;  the  earli- 
est Passion  play,  10;  the  Mystery  or 
Miracle  play,  n,  12;  the  realism  of 
the  semi-sacred  play,  12,  13 ;  the  Mo- 
ralities, 14-16;  the  Interlude,  17,  18; 
the  earliest  comedies,  19;  the  com- 
parative development  of  comedy  and 
tragedy,  21 ;  Chronicle  plays,  23,  149 ; 
Lyly's  comedies,  25,  162,  163 ;  the  im- 
mediate predecessors  and  older  con- 
temporaries of  the  poet  in,  24,  155 ;  its 
condition  about  1585,  26,  105-118; 
tragedy,  28. 

Drama,  Elizabethan,  the,  105-118;  full  of 
the  spirit  of  the  age,  113  ;  growth  of,  114, 
125  ;  surprisingly  wholesome  in  view  of 
the  influence  of  the  Italian  Renaissance, 
132-134;  as  a  literary  form,  135;  as 
an  opportunity  of  expression,  136 ;  un- 
certainty of  the  text  of,  140 ;  the  ethical 
significance  of  Shakespearian,  342- 


359.  See  Histories,  Comedies,  and 
Tragedies  of  Shakespeare. 

Drayton,  Michael,  portrait  of,  179;  al- 
luded to,  197,  216. 

Droeshout,  Martin,  portrait  of  Shake- 
speare by,  150,  273,  400,  401. 

Drummond  of  Hawthornden,  373. 

"  Duchess  of  Norfolk,"  24. 

"  Duke  Humphrey,"  24. 

Earl  of  Worcester's  Company  of  Play- 
ers, 39. 

Eastcheap,  98. 

Edgar  Tower,  the,  at  Worcester,  85. 

Editions  of  Shakespeare's  works.  See 
under  First  Folio. 

Education,  not  necessarily  academic,  41, 
42;  formal  literary,  in  Shakespeare's 
time,  44 ;  the  poet's  early,  46-51. 

"Edward  III.,"  23. 

Elizabeth,  Princess,  the  marriage  of,  374, 
382, 391. 

Elizabeth,  Queen,  her  delight  in  pageants, 
52 ;  visits  Warwickshire,  52-56 ;  diver- 
sions at  Kenilworth  in  honour  of,  53 ; 
the  splendour  of,  55 ;  a  patron  of  the 
theatre,  106;  her  enjoyment  of  Falstaff, 
262 ;  at  the  opening  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  284,  290 ;  her  death,  320. 

English  Language,  the,  when  Shake- 
speare began  to  use  it,  134. 

Essex.    See  Devereux. 

"  Euphues,"  25,  137. 

Fairfax,  his  "  Tasso,"  229,  293. 

Falstaff,  his  fondness  for  Eastcheap,  98; 
the  humour  of,  237 ;  at  first  named  Sir 
John  Oldcastle,  238 ;  the  character  of, 
developed  in  "The  Merry  Wives  of 
Windsor,"  by  order  of  Elizabeth,  262, 
263. 

"Ferrex  and  Porrex,"or  "Gorbordoc,"22. 

Field,  Richard,  101 ;  publisher  of  the 
earliest  of  Shakespeare's  publications, 
101, 187, 191 ;  of  other  influential  works, 
102,  187. 

Fleay,  318. 

Fletcher,  John,  alluded  to,  239,  384,  385, 
386 ;  his  portrait,  231. 

Florio,  John,  his  "  Montaigne,"  293,  306, 
381. 

Folio,  the  First,  alluded  to,  381,  364;  the 
editors  of,  402,  404. 

Forest  of  Arden,  30,  62,  64,  73,  74,  186, 
266,267. 


4I2 


INDEX 


Forman,  Dr.  Simon,  328,  369,  374;  his 

"  Book  of  Plays,"  374. 
Fortune  Theatre,  109,  116. 
French,  Shakespeare's  knowledge  of,  46, 

47- 
Fuller,  Thomas,   quoted  as   comparing 

Jonson  and  Shakespeare,  275. 

"  Gammer  Gurton's  Needle,"  19. 

Gastrell,  Rev.  Francis,  258. 

Geoffrey  of  Monmouth,  his  "  Historia 
Britonum,"  330. 

Ghost,  the,  in  Hamlet  played  by  Shake- 
speare, 117. 

Globe  Theatre,  illustration  of,  25,  115; 
described,  109 ;  built  by  Richard  Bur- 
bage,  116;  "Richard  II."  at  the,  286; 
"  Macbeth  "  at  the,  328  ;  the  burning 
of  the,  383;  its  receipts,  389;  the  Globe 
company,  310;  alluded  to,  198,  241, 

369.  374- 

Gollancz,  quoting  Gabriel  Harvey,  197. 

Grammar  School,  the,  of  Stratford,  31, 
38;  described,  42-44;  a  free  school, 
48;  Shakespeare's  early  leaving,  49, 
51 ;  alluded  to,  54,  160,  293. 

Grammaticus,  Saxo,  301. 

Granville,  138. 

Grave,  the,  of  Shakespeare,  and  the  lines 
above  it,  396-398 :  of  Anne  Hathaway 
and  its  inscription,  399. 

Gray's  Inn  Fields,  98. 

Green,  on  the  Elizabethan  Theatre,  114. 

Greene,  Robert,  one  of  Shakespeare's 
older  contemporaries,  26 ;  a  born  story- 
teller, 27 ;  credited  with  part  author- 
ship of  "  Henry  VI.,"  152;  his  history, 
155 ;  his  fight  against  the  new  order, 
157 ;  his  attack  on  Marlowe,  158 ;  his 
attack  on  Shakespeare,  159;  his  "A 
Groatsworth  of  Wit,"  156,  274,  370; 
his  reference  to  an  early  Hamlet,  302 ; 
his  "  Pandasto,"  370 ;  alluded  to,  137, 
229,  266,  372,  373. 

Greene,  Thomas,  town  clerk  of  Stratford, 

395- 

Greenwich  Palace,  261. 

"  Groatsworth  of  Wit,"  Greene's  pam- 
phlet, 156,  274,  370. 

Guild  Chapel,  the,  at  Stratford,  31, 42, 43, 
74,  257,  260. 

Hagenbach,  quoted,  7. 
Hall  of  the  Middle  Temple,  268 ;  illus- 
tration, 269. 


Hall,  Dr.  John,  258,  391,  395,  399. 

Hall,  Elizabeth,  258,  391,  392,  396. 

Hall,  Mrs.  Susannah.  See  Shakespeare, 
Susannah. 

Hall,  William,  223,  242,  292. 

Halliwell-Phillipps  quoted,  77,  93. 

Hamlet,  the  character,  compared  to 
Brutus,  298 ;  origin  of  his  story,  300- 
302;  aspects  of  his  character,  306-308. 

"  Hamlet,"  23;  the  Ghost,  Shakespeare's 
most  notable  r&le,  117;  shows  traces  of 
the  older  drama,  147 ;  sources  of,  300- 
303  ;  first  published,  304 ;  problems  of, 
306;  alluded  to,  118,  240,  248,  298,  315, 
381. 

Hampton  Lucy,  the  road  to,  69-72. 

Hampton  Lucy  bridge,  70. 

Hart,  Joan,  35.     See  Shakespeare,  Joan. 

Harvey,  Gabriel,  197. 

Hathaway,  Anne,  alluded  to,  29,  38,  85; 
her  marriage  bond,  86-88 ;  her  hus- 
band's senior,  88  ;  her  children,  85,  87, 
91;  her  death,  399;  lines  over  her 
grave,  399. 

Hathaway,  Richard,  85 ;  father-in-law  oi 
Shakespeare,  85. 

Hazlitt,  on  "  Much  Ado  about  Nothing," 
265. 

Heine,  Heinrich,  350,  351. 

Heminge,  John,  one  of  Shakespeare's 
friends,  102,  398  ;  one  of  the  editors  of 
the  First  Folio,  108,  403 ;  one  of  the 
Lord  Chamberlain's  Men,  116. 

Henley  Street,  Stratford,  Shakespeare's 
birthplace  a  cottage  on,  33,  35,  36; 
alluded  to,  43,  361,  391,  392. 

Henrietta  Maria,  Queen,  entertained  at 
New  Place  in  1643,  258. 

Henry,  Prince  of  Wales,  son  of  James  I., 
portrait,  343. 

"Henry  IV.,"  230,  234,  235,  237,  239- 
241,  261,  262;  the  second  part,  255. 

"  Henry  V.,"  23,  230,  235,  236,  241,  261, 
286. 

"  Henry  VI.,"  Part  I.,  145 ;  its  three  parts, 
152-154,  156,  157,  160,  183,  230,  243. 

"Henry  VIII.,"  231,  241,  363,  383-385; 
source,  383 ;  its  first  night,  383. 

Herbert,  Philip,  Earl  of  Montgomery, 
404. 

Herbert,  William,  Earl  of  Pembroke, 
221,  222,  320,  404;  portrait,  213. 

"  Hero  and  Leander,"  28,  191. 

Heywood,  John,  18,  19. 

Heywood,  Thomas,  227,  229. 


INDEX 


413 


Histories,  the,  among  Shakespeare's 
plays,  228-231;  the  material  of,  143, 
149,  151,  242;  "  Richard  II.,"  232; 
"  King  John,"  233  ;  "  Henry  IV.,"  234- 
240;  "  Henry  V.,"  241 ;  "  Henry  VI.," 
153,243;  "  Henry  VIII.,"  241;  hardly 
second  to  the  Tragedies  in  importance, 

IS1- 

Holinshed's  "  Chronicles,"  the  indebted- 
ness of  Shakespeare  to,  151,  242,  292, 
369 ;  the  source  of  "  Henry  VI.,"  153 ; 
followed  in  "  Richard  II."  and  "  Rich- 
ard III.,"  232,  233,  294;  the  source  of 
"  Henry  IV.,"  235  ;  suggested  "  Mac- 
beth," 325  ;  and  "  King  Lear,"  330. 

Holy  Trinity  Church,  Stratford,  31 ;  illus- 
tration, 45  ;  alluded  to,  71,  74,  88,  260; 
bust  of  Shakespeare  in,  272,  273,  399, 
400. 

Holy  Trinity  Churchyard,  256,  392,  397. 

"  Hotspur,"  24.  , 

Inferences  from  a  dramatist's  work  dan- 
gerous, 88-90. 
Interlude,  the,  17,  18. 
Italian,  Shakespeare's  knowledge  of,  46, 

47- 

Italy,  the  teacher  of  Western  Europe, 
21 ;  its  influence  on  England  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  120,  121 ;  possible 
visit  of  Shakespeare  to,  119,  124;  its 
influence  on  Chaucer  and  others,  120, 
and  on  the  English  imagination,  132- 
134;  its  general  influence  on  Europe, 
161,  162,  209. 

Jaggard,  William,  226. 

James  I.  on  the  growth  of  London,  99 ; 
a  patron  of  the  stage,  320,  329;  por- 
trait, 337;  alluded  to,  290. 

Jew,  the,  in  1596,  253,  254. 

Johnson,  Robert,  382. 

Jonson,  Ben,  ridiculed  for  including  plays 
among  his  "  Works,"  141 ;  prices  paid 
for  his  plays,  142;  his  "  Irene,"  189  ;  a 
contributor  to  Chester's  "  Love's  Mar- 
tyr," 225  ;  portrait,  278  ;  a  combatant 
in  the  "  War  of  the  Theatres,"  277- 
279 ;  a  sketch  of  the  life  of,  280-284 ; 
his  personal  appearance,  281 ;  his  char- 
acter, 281,  282;  his  criticism  of  Shake- 
speare's lack  of  scholarship,  282;  his 
tribute  to  Shakespeare,  283;  the  "  Poet- 
aster," 284;  his  "  Sejanus  "  and  "  Cati- 
line," 299;  the  spelling  of  his  name, 


394  ;  his  Eulogy  of  Shakespeare  in  the 
First  Folio,  404;    alluded  to,  47,  229, 

239,  375- 

Jonson,  Gerard,  273,  399. 

"Julius  Caesar,"  criticised  by  Jonson, 
282;  political  situation  when  it  was 
written,  290;  source  of,  in  Plutarch, 
293;  modification  of  the  original  in, 
294,  295  ;  publication  of,  296  ;  analysis 
of  the  play,  296,  299,  338  ;  preserved  in 
the  First  Folio,  404. 

Kempe,  279. 

Kenilworth  Castle,  52;  the  entertain- 
ment of  Queen  Elizabeth  at,  53,  56; 
old  drawing  of,  57  ;  alluded  to,  58,  65  ; 
Mervyn's  Tower,  58,  59  ;  the  loveliness 
of  its  ruins,  61. 

"  King  Johan,"  23. 

"  King  John,"  the  prelude  of  the  histori- 
cal plays,  230  ;  completed  about  1595, 
233  ;  a  recast,  233  ;  has  no  hero,  234. 

"  King  Lear,"  description  of  Dover  cliff 
in,  46;  its  landscape  exceptional,  62; 
the  sublimest  height  of  the  poet's  tragic 
art,  329;  performed  before  the  King, 
329  ;  sources  of,  330,  331  ;  analysis  of, 
331-335  ;  alluded  to,  23,  325,  372. 

King's  servants,  the,  320,  321. 

Kyd,  Thomas,  one  of  Shakespeare's 
immediate  predecessors  as  a  play- 
wright, 26,  229  ;  his  "  Spanish  Tragedy," 


Landor,  Walter  Savage,  his  "Citation 
and  Examination  of  William  Shake- 
speare," 84. 

Landscape,  influence  of,  on  the  verse  of 
Scott,  Burns,  Wordsworth,  62;  the 
Italian,  64. 

Latin,  Shakespeare's  knowledge  of,  44,  46. 

Law,  Shakespeare's  knowledge  of,  47. 

Lee,  Sidney,  on  Shakespeare's  Sonnets, 
218  ;  on  his  acting  before  King  James, 
321  ;  on  his  expenditures,  390. 

Leicester,  the  Earl  of,  his  entertainment 
of  Queen  Elizabeth,  53,  56,  61  ;  por- 
trait, 1588,  60  ;  his  company  of  players, 
106-108,  114. 

Leicester  Hospital,  65. 

Lodge,  his  death  in  1625,  26;  his  plays, 
27  ;  one  of  the  group  in  possession  of 
the  stage  on  the  arrival  of  Shake- 
speare, 25,  155,  229;  his  "  Rosalynde" 
the  source  of  the  plot  of  •"  As  You  Like 


INDEX 


it,"  266 ;  his  allusion  to  an  early  Ham- 
let, 302 ;  alluded  to,  156,  267. 

London,  Shakespeare's  journey  to,  91; 
in  the  sixteenth  century,  96;  streets, 
97;  the  city,  98  :  its  growth,  98-100;  in 
1543,  198-200 ;  alluded  to,  90,  160. 

London  Bridge,  96,  99. 

"  Lord  Chamberlain's  Men,"  the,  116, 
270. 

"  Love's  Labour's  Lost,"  the  first  touches 
of  the  poet's  hand  shown  in  among 
others,  145;  betrays  the  influence  of 
Lyly,  160,  166;  played  before  the 
Queen,  164;  satirizes  the  times,  165, 
183;  betrays  the  youth  of  the  writer, 
166 ;  analysis  of,  167-170 ;  three  poems 
from,  in  "  The  Passionate  Pilgrim," 
226;  alluded  to,  204,  249. 

"  Love's  Labour's  Won,"  mentioned  by 
Meres,  probably  the  same  as  "  All's 
Well  that  Ends  Well,"  311. 

Lucy,  Sir  Peter,  83. 

Lucy,  Sir  Thomas,  of  Charlecote,  52,  82, 
83,85. 

Lydgate,  his  Troy  Book,  317. 

Lyly,  John,  a  sketch  of,  160-163;  his 
influence  on  Shakespeare's  "  Love's 
Labour's  Lost,"  160,  166,  179 ;  one 
of  the  group  in  possession  of  the  stage 
on  Shakespeare's  arrival  in  London, 
229 ;  his  "  Euphues,"  25,  137,  163. 

Lyrical  poetry,  Shakespeare's  contribu- 
tion to,  209. 

"  Macbeth,"  contrast  of  landscape  in  this 
and  other  plays,  62 ;  contains  traces  of 
the  older  drama,  147 ;  sources  of,  325  ; 
analysis  of,  326;  parts  of,  said  to  be 
by  Middleton,  327;  De  Quincey  on 
the  introduction  of  the  comic  element, 
328 ;  Dr.  Forman's  account  of  the  per- 
formance of,  in  1611,  328;  unprinted 
until  in  the  First  Folio,  404. 

Magdalen  College,  Oxford,  160. 

Malone,  on  the  authorship  of  "  Henry 
VI.,"  152. 

Manningham,  John,  quoted,  268,  370. 

Marlowe,  Christopher,  leader  of  the 
group  of  men  who  controlled  the 
stage  at  the  time  of  Shakespeare's 
arrival  in  London,  26,  138,  155,  229; 
a  sketch  of,  27 ;  his  writings,  28 ;  his 
influence  on  English  poetry,  136,  146, 
147 ;  his  death,  137 ;  credited  with  part 
authorship  of  "  Henry  VI.,"  152^  at- 


tacked by  Greene,  157,  158 ;  his  influ- 
ence shown  in  some  of  Shakespeare's 
plays,  160, 179,  231,  233,  252;  identified 
by  some  with  the  poet's  "  rival  singer  " 
of  the  Sonnets,  216;  the  parallelism 
between  his  "  Edward  II."  and  Shake- 
speare's "  Richard  II.,"  232;  his  "  Dr. 
Faustus,"  28 ;  his  "  Hero  and  Lean- 
der,"  190;  his  "Jew  of  Malta,"  252; 
his  "  Tamburlaine,"  27,  157,  158,  232. 

Marston,  225,  229. 

Mass,  the,  a  dramatization  of  certain 
fundamental  ideas,  7 ;  of  the  central 
mystery  of  the  Christian  faith,  8. 

Masuccio,  the  story  of  Romeo  and  Juliet 
sketched  by,  201. 

"  Measure  for  Measure,"  Shakespeare's 
modifications  of  the  story  of,  315,  316; 
sources  of,  316,  322;  produced  about 
1603,  316. 

Menaechmi  of  Plautus,  the,  probable 
source  of  the  plot  of  "  The  Comedy 
of  Errors,"  172;  said  to  be  like 
"  Twelfth  Night "  by  John  Manning- 
ham,  269. 

Meredith,  George,  quoted  on  the  comic 
characters  of  Shakespeare,  251. 

Meres,  Francis,  on  Shakespeare's  poetry, 
196;  his  "  Palladis  Tamia,"  311;  his 
mention  of  "  Love's  Labour's  Won," 

3ii. 
Mervyn's  Tower,  Kenilworth  Castle,  58, 

59- 

Middle  Ages,  isolation  of  castles  and 
communities  in  the,  5. 

Middle  Temple  Lane,  illustration,  294. 

Middleton,  Thomas,  229,  327. 

Milton,  alluded  to,  121. 

Mimes,  or  players,  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
5;  condemned  by  the  Church,  6. 

Miracle  play,  n;  its  realism,  12;  com- 
pared with  the  Moralities,  15 ;  alluded 
to,  20. 

"Mirrour  of  Magistrates,"  22. 

Moralities,  the,  14;  compared  to  the 
Mystery  and  Miracle  plays,  15 ;  the 
important  step  in  dramatic  develop- 
ment marked  by,  16;  gradual  transi- 
tion to  the  fully  developed  play  from, 

17- 

More,  Sir  Thomas,  18. 

"  Much  Ado  about  Nothing,"  the  perfec- 
tion of  witty  dialogue  and  repartee,  25  ; 
its  contrast  to  "The  Merry  Wives  of 
Windsor,"  264 ;  date  and  sources,  265. 


INDEX 


415 


Mystery  play,  the,  foreshadowed  in  the 
fourth  century  Passion  play,  10;  in  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries,  u  ;  its 
realism  in  the  fifteenth  century,  12; 
compared  with  the  Moralities,  15; 
alluded  to,  20. 

Nash,  Thomas,  one  of  the  playwrights 
controlling  the  stage  just  before  the 
arrival  of  Shakespeare  in  London,  26, 
229 ;  his  character,  27,  155  ;  addressed 
by  Greene  in  "A  Groatsworth  of 
Wit,"  156 ;  drawn  into  the  "  War  of 
the  Theatres"  by  Greene,  158;  his 
comment  on  "  Henry  VI.,"  153. 

Nashe,  Thomas,  marries  Elizabeth  Hall, 
the  granddaughter  of  Shakespeare,  258, 
397 ;  his  wife,  258,  392 ;  portrait  of, 
169. 

New  Place,  Stratford,  Shakespeare's 
home  in,  31,  93;  the  purchase  of,  257, 
361;  now  a  garden,  259;  a  commodi- 
ous building,  391. 

North,  Thomas,  his  translation  of  Plu- 
tarch, 102,  151,  293. 

Norton,  collaborator  with  Sackville  in 
"  Gorbordoc,"  22. 

Old  Clopton  Bridge,  31,  39;  illustration, 

324. 
"Othello,"    mistakes   in,   122;    contains 

traces  of  the  older  drama,  147  ;  sources, 

322;    played   before    the   King,    322; 

analysis   of  characters,   322-325;    the 

great  popularity  of,  323. 
Oxford,  93,  95. 

Pageants,  in  the  fifteenth  century,  n,  12. 

"  Passionate  Pilgrim,  the,"  piratical  pub- 
lication of  Shakespeare's  poems  in, 
208,  226 ;  Shakespeare's  name  omitted 
from  the  title-page  of  the  second  edi- 
tion of,  227. 

Passion  play,  in  the  fourth  century,  10. 

Pater,  Mr.,  162,  167.     • 

Paynter,  his  "  Palace  of  Pleasure,"  312, 
334,  376. 

Peele,  one  of  the  playwrights  just  preced- 
ing Shakespeare  on  the  Elizabethan 
stage,  26,  155,  229;  his  characteristics, 
27 ;  credited  with  part  authorship  in 
"Henry  VI.,"  152;  addressed  by  Greene 
in  "A  Groatsworth  of  Wit,"  156 ;  Shake- 
speare drawn  to,  179. 

Pembroke,  Earl  of.    See  Herbert. 

2E 


"  Pericles,"  a  new  note  struck  in,  362 ; 
sources,  364 ;  a  drama  of  reconciliation, 
387 ;  omitted  from  the  First  Folio,  404. 

Personification  inevitable  to  an  imagina- 
tive race,  2. 

Petrarch,  the  master  of  sonnet  form  in 
Italy,  209 ;  Surrey  and  Wyatt's  trans- 
lations of  sonnets  by,  210;  Shake- 
speare's modification  of  the  sonnet 
form  used  by,  211. 

Phillips,  Augustus,  108,  116. 

Plague,  in  London,  124. 

Plautus,  the  source  of  the  plot  of  "  The 
Comedy  of  Errors,"  172,  173,  269; 
Shakespeare's  acquaintance  with,  44. 

Player,  the  strolling,  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
5 ;  condemned  by  the  Church,  6;  his 
position  in  England  after  the  Conquest, 
6 ;  the  professional,  created  by  the 
Moralities,  16;  in  Shakespeare's  time, 
39.  See  Actor. 

Plays,  in  Shakespeare's  time,  139;  fre- 
quently altered,  140;  property  of  the 
theatre,  139-141 ;  rarely  published,  141. 

Plutarch,  his  influence  on  Shakespeare, 
292,  376;  North's  translation  of,  102, 
151, 293 ;  the  story  of  Timon  from,  334 ; 
the  story  of  Antony  from,  335;  the 
story  of  "Coriolanus"  from,  339. 

Poaching,  Rowe's  story  of  Shakespeare's, 
82. 

Portraits  of  Shakespeare,  273,  400-402; 
the  "  Ely  House "  portrait,  frontis- 
piece; the  Stratford  portrait,  37;  the 
Zoust  portrait,  94;  the  Black  Bust, 
owned  by  the  Garrick  Club,  123 ;  the 
J.  Q.  A.  Ward  statue  in  Central 
Park,  New  York,  135 ;  the  Droeshout 
engraving,  150;  the  statue  on  the 
Gower  Memorial,  171 ;  the  monument 
in  Holy  Trinity  Church,  Stratford, 
272. 

Puritan  party,  in  opposition  to  theatres, 
106,  125,  130-133;  Shakespeare  not  a 
member  of  the,  354,  395. 

Queen's  Company  of  Players,  the,  39. 
Quiney,  Richard,  37,  260. 
Quiney,  Thomas,  38,  260,  393. 

Raleigh,  Sir  Walter,  138,  163. 
"  Ralph  Roister  Doister,"  19. 
Ravenscroft,  Edward,  146. 
Register  of  the  Stationers  Company,  79, 
144.  252. 


416 


INDEX 


Religion  in  the  fifteenth  century,  13, 
14. 

Renaissance  influence,  the,  at  its  height 
in  Shakespeare's  time,  44;  Italy  the 
birthplace  of,  120 ;  surprisingly  whole- 
some considering  the  moral  life  of 
Italy  at  the  time,  132-134 ;  made 
Europe  a  community  in  intellectual 
interests,  161 ;  the  suggestiveness  of, 
181 ;  freedom  secured  by,  184,  185, 
343.  355 '.  l°ve  °f  beauty  a  character- 
istic of,  190,  343. 

"Richard  II.,"  published  in  1597,  148; 
reflects  the  genius  of  Marlowe,  160, 

230,  232;    revived  at  the  Globe,  286; 
its  outline  taken  from  Holinshed,  294. 

"  Richard  III.,"  published  in  1597,  148; 
reflects  the  genius  of  Marlowe,  160, 

231,  232;  Holinshed  followed  in,  232, 
294. 

Richardson,  Locke,  48. 

Robsart,  Amy,  imprisoned  in  Mervyn's 
Tower,  58,  59. 

Romances,  the,  363,  366,  368,  387 ;  "  Peri- 
cles," 363,  364 ;  "  Cymbeline,"  364,  365  ; 
"  The  Winter's  Tale,"  372-375  ;  "  The 
Tempest,"  377-383- 

Rome,  the  theatre  of,  4,  5. 

"Romeo  and  Juliet,"  mistakes  in,  122; 
shows  among  the  first  touches  of  the 
poet's  hand,  145 ;  published  in  1597, 
148 ;  in  the  front  rank  of  English 
poetry,  183 ;  shows  the  poet's  develop- 
ment, 184 ;  sources,  200,  201 ;  analysis 
of,  201-203;  affiliated  to  "A  Midsum- 
mer Night's  Dream"  in  lyric  quality, 
204 ;  alluded  to,  324. 

Rose,  the,  115,  116,  142,  198;  production 
of"  Henry  VI."  at,  153,  243. 

Rowe,  his  story  of  Shakespeare's  poach- 
ing, 82;  quoted  again,  104,  117,  262. 

Sackville,   one  of  the  authors  of  "  Gor- 

bordoc,"  22. 
Sandells,  Fulk,  86. 
Schlegel,  quoted,  on  the  historical  plays, 

246. 

Sea-  Venture,  the,  378. 
Shakespeare,  Edmund,  397. 
Shakespeare,  Gilbert,  397. 
Shakespeare,   Hamnet,  91 ;    his   death, 

230,  256,  290,  391 ;  his  grave,  397. 
Shakespeare,  Joan,  sister  of  William,  35, 

392,  398;  the  grandson '  of,  392 ;  three 

sons  of,  398.    See  Hart. 


Shakespeare,  John,  32;  his  marriage  to 
Mary  Arden,33;  his  public  offices,  34; 
his  children,  34;  his  means,  39;  finan- 
cial embarrassments,  49,  50,  255; 
alluded  to,  101,256;  his  coat-of-arms, 
32,  256,  257;  his  death,  289,  391. 

Shakespeare,  Judith,  the  poet's  youngest 
daughter,  38,  391 ;  baptized,  91 ;  mar- 
ried Thomas  Quiney,  38,  260,  393,  398  ; 
her  sons,  393 ;  bequest  to,  in  the  poet's 
will,  398;-  her  death,  394;  her  grave, 

397- 

Shakespeare,  Mary,  the  poet's  mother, 
wife  of  John,  33;  heiress  of  Robert 
Arden  of  Wilmcote,  256;  death  of, 

39i- 

Shakespeare,  Richard,  33,  397. 

Shakespeare,  Susannah,  first  child  of 
William,  87,  91,  391,  393,  396,  397; 
marriage  of,  391,  392;  verse  written 
of,  392. 

Shakespeare,  William,  development  of 
the  English  drama  before  his  time,  16- 
28 ;  the  dramatic  form  all  but  per- 
fected by  his  forerunners,  24;  his 
immediate  predecessors  and  older  con- 
temporaries, 27, 155,  229 ;  his  birth  and 
birthplace,  30-35 ;  at  four  years  old, 
39;  his  formal  education,  42-51 ;  after 
leaving  school,  51,  77;  our  knowledge 
of  his  life,  77,  80 ;  characteristics  of  his 
youth,  80,  81 ;  his  departure  from 
Stratford,  82,  90;  his  marriage  and 
marriage  bond,  85-88;  his  children, 
85,  87,  91,  256,  258,  260,  391-394;  his 
journey  to  London,  91,  93 ;  his  arrival, 
95 ;  early  association  with  theatres  a 
matter  of  tradition,  103;  joins  Lord 
Leicester's  Players,  108;  in  the  com- 
pany of  "  Lord  Chamberlain's  Men," 
as  actor  and  manager,  116-118;  tours 
of  his  company,  119;  his  knowledge 
of  Italy,  119-124;  order  of  composi- 
tion of  his  plays,  144 ;  his  versification, 
145;  earliest  touches  of  his  hand,  145- 
147;  his  first  play  in  print,  148;  his 
part  in  "  Henry  VI.,"  152, 154 ;  attacked 
by  Greene,  156-159 ;  "  Love's  Labour's 
Lost,"  161-170;  "The  Comedy  of 
Errors,"  170-174;  "The  Two  Gentle- 
men of  Verona,"  175;  the  poetic 
period,  177-227;  stages  of  his  poetic 
growth,  184 ;  the  publication  of"  Venus 
and  Adonis,"  187,  195;  of  "The  Rape 
of  Lucrece,"  191,  195;  culmination 


INDEX 


417 


of  the  lyrical  period,  199 ;  "  Romeo 
and  Juliet,"  199-203;  "A  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream,"  203-206;  the  Sonnets, 
207-224 ;  "  The  Rape  of  Lucrece,"  224 ; 
"A  Lover's  Complaint,"  224,  225; 
"The  Phoenix  and  the  Turtle," 225; 
"  The  Passionate  Pilgrim,"  226, 227;  the 
Histories,  228-247 ;  the  Comedies,  248- 
255,  261-270;  his  return  to  Warwick- 
shire, 256,  290,  388;  the  purchase  of 
New  Place  by,  257,  362 ;  its  restoration, 
258-260,  361 ;  the  approach  of  tragedy, 
271-289 ;  portraits  of,  273,  400,  401 ; 
social  disposition  of,  274 ;  the  "  War 
of  the  Theatres,"  277-280,  310;  the 
earlier  Tragedies,  290-314;  the  later 
;\  Tragedies, 314-341;  ethical  significance 
Y\>f  the  Tragedies,  342-359 ;  his  view  of 
man's  place  in  nature,  346 ;  his  study 
of  character  in  the  Tragedies,  347-349 ; 
as  a  poet,  349-351 ;  the  Tragedies  the 
highest  point  of  his  art,  351 ;  his  ethi- 
cal view  of  life,  353 ;  his  relations  to 
the  Puritan  party,  354,  395 ;  his  large- 
ness of  view,  357-359 ;  the  Romances : 
"Pericles,  363,  364;  "  Cymbeline," 
364,  365 ;  "  The  Winter's  Tale,"  372- 
375;  "The  Tempest,"  377-383;  his 
greatness  as  a  poet,  376 ;  his  share 
in  "Henry  VIII.,"  384-385;  attitude 
toward  life  of  the  Romances,  387 ;  his 
last  years  in  Stratford,  388  ;  his  income, 
389;  his  general  circumstances,  390, 
391 ;  his  family,  301-394 ;  the  spelling 
of  his  name,  394 ;  his  religion  unknown, 
395;  his  will,  395,  397~399;  nis  death, 
395;  lines  over  his  grave,  397,  398; 
the  Stratford  bust  and  other  portraits 
of,  399-402 ;  the  First  Folio,  402-404 ; 
his  personal  character,  404-407. 

Shallow,  Justice,  52,  68,  82,  83,  85. 

Shaw,  Julius,  259. 

Shottery,  30, 61, 72,  86, 87 ;  the  path  to,  79. 

Sidney,  Sir  Philip,  his  "Arcadia,"  and 
"Apologie  for  Poesie,"  138,  229,  321; 
portrait,  139;  alluded  to,  22,  266,  287, 

394- 

Sill,  Mr.,  quoted,  239. 

Snider,  Denton,  quoted,  342. 

Somers,  Sir  George,  and  the  Sea-  Venture, 
378. 

Sonnets,  a  favorite  poetic  form  in  the 
closing  decade  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
207,  208;  introduced  from  Italy  by 
Surrey  and  Wyatt,  209;  their  transla- 


tions of  Petrarch's,  210;  other  collec- 
tions of,  210;   modern  sequences  of, 

211. 

Sonnets  of  Shakespeare,  the,  207 ;  pub- 
lished, 208;  a  sequence,  211;  analysis 
of,  214;  interpretations  of,  218-220; 
alluded  to,  273,  345,  366,  405. 

Sonnetteers  of  Shakespeare's  time,  210. 

Southampton,  Earl  of.  See  Wriothes- 
ley. 

Spedding,  Mr.,  384,  385. 

Spenser,  Edmund,  a  well-known  name 
in  Shakespeare's  time,  138, 229 ;  Shake- 
speare's love  of  pastoral  life  shared  by, 
266,  267 ;  his  laxity  in  spelling  of 
names,  even  his  own,  394;  his  "Colin 
Clout,"  229;  his"  Epithalamium,"229; 
alluded  to,  287. 

Still,  John,  20. 

St.  Pancras,  98. 

St.  Paul's  Cathedral,  96,  98. 

St.  Paul's  Churchyard,  191. 

Stratford-on-Avon,  its  charm,  29;  Shake- 
spearian associations,  29;  in  1564,  30; 
its  population,  32;  Henley  Street,  33- 
37;  its  love  of  the  drama,  40;  the 
Grammar  School  and  Guild  Chapel, 
43,  74;  the  landscape  between  Kenil- 
worth  and,  54,  58,  65;  the  byways 
about,  60,  61;  Warwick  from,  66; 
between  Hampton  Lucy  and,  71; 
events  which  led  to  the  poet's  departure 
from,  82-85,  90;  men  from,  among 
Shakespeare's  friends,  101,  102,  187; 
touches  of,  in  the  poems  or  plays  of 
Shakespeare,  186,  255;  Shakespeare's 
return  to,  256,  290,  388  ;  his  restoration 
of  New  Place  in,  257,361 ;  later  history 
of  New  Place,  258-260,  391,  392,  398 ; 
the  bust  of  Shakespeare  in  the  church 
at,  272,  273 ;  the  poet's  property  at,  361, 

390-393. 

Stuart,  Mary,  55. 
Surrey,  120,  162,  209-211. 
Symonds,  quoted,  157. 

Tableaux  of  New  Testament  scenes  in 
the  fifth  century,  9. 

Talbot  Inn,  Chaucer's  "  Tabard,"  illus- 
tration, 20:  alluded  to,  115. 

Ten  Brink,  quoted,  368. 

Thames,  the  principal  thoroughfare,  98, 

"  The  Atheist's  Tragedy,"  133. 

Theatre,  the,  101,  103,  108,  114,  243;  the 
library  of,  142, 148. 


4i8 


INDEX 


Theatre  of  Rome,  4 ;  increasingly  vulgar  I 
as  the  populace  sank,  5. 

Theatres  of  London  in  Shakespeare's 
time,  101,  108;  their  character,  105, 
113 ;  opposition  of  the  Puritan  element 
to,  106,  125 ;  support  of  Queen  Eliza- 
beth, 106;  arrangements  of,  109-111; 
costume  and  scenery,  in,  112;  attend- 
ance on,  114;  location  of,  127;  oppo- 
sition of  the  City  to,  130;  of  the 
Puritan  party,  131. 

"The  Comedy  of  Errors,"  shows  some 
of  the  first  touches  of  the  poet's  hand, 
145;  first  published,  170;  presented 
at  Gray's  Inn,  172;  sources  of,  172; 
comparison  with  the  play  of  Plautus, 
173 ;  moral  sanity  of,  174 ;  humour  of, 
183;  alluded  to,  204,  249. 

"The  contention  of  the  two  famous 
houses  of  York  and  Lancaster,"  23. 

"The  Duchess  of  Amalfi,"  133. 

"  The  Massacre  at  Paris,"  27. 

"  The  Merchant  of  Venice,"  evidence  of 
Shakespeare's  foreign  travel,  121,  122; 
produced  about  1596,  252 ;  sources  of, 
253 ;  modification  of  the  original  mate- 
rial, 253 ;  the  poet's  treatment  of  the 
Jew  in,  252-254. 

"  The  Passionate  Pilgrim,"  137,  177,  226, 
227. 

"The  Phoenix  and  Turtle,"  137,  177, 
225. 

"The  Rape  of  Lucrece,"  101,  137.  183, 
191-197,  209,  222,  224. 

"  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  allusions 
in,  evidence  of  the  poet's  foreign  travel, 
122;  unmistakable  references  to  War- 
wickshire in,  240,  255 ;  based  on  an 
older  play,  254. 

"  The  Tempest,"  predicted  by"  Pericles," 
freshness  of,  365 ;  sources,  377 ;  the 
wreck  of  the  Sea- Venture,  378,  379; 
analysis  of,  380-382 ;  title-page  of,  381 ; 
probably  his  last  play,  383,  386,  409; 
not  published  before  the  First  Folio 
appeared,  404;  alluded  to,  60,  387. 

"  The  True  Tragedy  of  Richard  III.,"  23. 

11  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  mis- 
takes of  locality  in,  122;  shows  some 
of  the  first  touches  of  the  poet's  hand, 
145;  sources  of,  175;  slender  in  plot, 
183 ;  in  certain  of  its  aspects  of  life  con- 
nected with  "A  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream,"  204;  comedy  form  of,  249; 
alluded  to,  362. 


'  The  Winter's  Tale,"  flowers  of  War- 
wickshire in,  62;  alluded  to,  362;  its 
freshness,  365 ;  sources  of,  370-372 ; 
produced  about  1611,  374;  its  popu- 
larity, 374;  analysis  of,  374;  alluded 
to,  387,  408. 

1  Titus  Andronicus,"  included  among 
Shakespeare's  plays,  145,  146,  148,  178, 
183 ;  a  characteristic  Elizabethan  play, 
146,  147;  analysis  of,  178. 

Tourneur,  Cyril,  alluded  to,  120,  132. 

Tower  of  London,  the,  96. 

Trade-guilds,  centres  of  organized  pres- 
entation of  Miracle  plays,  n. 

Tragedy,  English,  28. 

Tragedies  of  Shakespeare,  the,  245,  248, 
271,  278,  290,  314,  320,  360,  363,  364, 
366-369, 388 ;  "  Julius  Caesar,"  293-299; 
"Hamlet,"  300-311;  "All's  Well  that 
Ends  Well,"  311-313;  "Measure  for 
Measure,"  315,  316;  "  Troilus  and 
Cressida,"  316-320;  "Othello,"  322- 
325;  "Macbeth,"  325-329;  "King 
Lear,"  329-333  ;  "  Timon  of  Athens," 
333.  334 1  "  Antony  and  Cleopatra," 
335-338  I  "Coriolan us,"  339-341;  ethi- 
cal significance  of,  342-359 ;  the  high- 
est point  of  Shakespeare's  art,  351 ;  the 
great  insight  of,  due  to  Shakespeare's 
largeness  of  view,  358. 

"Troilus  and  Cressida,"  supposed  to 
have  had  a  part  in  the  "  War  of  the 
Theatres,"  279 ;  painful  and  repellent, 
315;  belongs  to  the  year  1603,  316; 
sources,  317;  analysis  of,  317-319; 
alluded  to,  345. 

"Twelfth  Night,"  produced,  1601,  268; 
source  of,  269,  270;  analysis  of,  270: 
alluded  to,  362. 

Twine,  Lawrence,  364. 

Udall,  Nicholas,  19. 

Vautrollier,  Thomas,  101. 
"Venus  and  Adonis,"  101,  137,  183,  x8<j, 
186-197. 

Walker,  William,  godson  to  Shake- 
speare, 398. 

"War  of  the  Theatres,"  the,  277,  280, 
309.  318. 

Warner,  William,  172. 

Warwick,  the  town  of,  66;  from  the  Cov- 
entry road,  89 ;  from  the  London  road, 
236- 


INDE* 


419 


Warwick  Castle,  67. 

Warwickshire  landscape,  the,  54,  56,  58- 
75 ;  Shakespeare's  familiarity  with,  57, 
61,  80,  260;  in  midsummer,  59;  the 
footpaths  in,  59-61 ;  touches  of,  in  all 
Shakespeare's  work,  62;  its  special 
charm,  64;  along  the  Avon  below  the 
bridge,  67 ;  references  to,  in  "  Henry 
VI.,"  240;  in  "The  Merry  Wives  of 
Windsor "  and  "  The  Taming  of  the 
Shrew,"  255. 

Webster,  alluded  to,  120,  132. 

Weever,  John,  196,  197. 


Whitehall,  the  old  Palace  at,  270;  acting 
before  the  King  at,  321,  329,  374. 

Wilmcote,  33,  49. 

Wilson,  his  "Cheerful  Ayres  and  Bal- 
lads," 383. 

Wilton  House,  320. 

Wotton,  on  the  Masque  at  Cardinal 
Wolsey's,  383. 

Wriothesley,  Henry,  Earl  of  Southamp- 
ton, 188,  192,  222,  285-288,  291;  por- 
trait, 223. 

Wyatt,  120,  209-211. 


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